Serpentine Serenade
by Evil Made
Summary: The wizarding world is a fickle thing, purity in light or darkness a thing of fiction. The smallest of change can alter the course of destiny, a single altered decision can shape the world itself very differently. AU. [Stalled indefinitely, basic future plot summary in chapter 3]
1. The Hat with the Emerald Jaw

Harry departed the train alone, the students already on the station platform affording him a wide berth and allowing him to pass unmolested. The guard at the exit from platform nine and three-quarters gave shot him an odd look, an interesting blend of equal parts fear and disgust. He found it deeply ironic that he was going to be almost glad to be back amongst muggles; at least they wouldn't stare at him for anything other than his poor clothing and general scruffiness.

It didn't take him long to locate his Aunt and Uncle; his uncle and Dudley especially stood out like sore thumbs purely for their immense size. They had apparently noticed that a lot of the people on the platform were eying their nephew with as much fear as they themselves held for him, if their expressions were anything to go by.

"You ready, boy?" Vernon remained as pleasant as ever, purple-faced and furious at Harry for simply existing.

"Yes." Harry's reply was mostly unnecessary as the man had already begun marching away from him at a brisk pace, practically fleeing from his presence. Harry smirked slightly at their reactions, finding himself exceptionally glad that his 'family' were oblivious to the fact that he was not allowed to use magic outside of Hogwarts.

**-=S-S=-**

Time passed at a relatively steady pace for Harry on Privet Drive, his relatives had been instilled with a renewed sense of fear of him upon seeing the general reaction to him at King's Cross. They had apparently taken the furtive glances and avoidance of his peers as being inspired by fear, and as such they were doing their very best to pretend he did not exist. The few times he had invaded their bubble of delusions they had tried their very best to avoid angering him, it had proved amusing at meal times at the very least.

That morning his Uncle had, in his politest and most strained business voice, asked him to spend the night in his room. Apparently the 'Masons' would be coming for dinner and a rather large business deal could potentially result. He had no real objections to spending the night in his room; it was pretty much what he was planning anyway, so he had readily agreed.

Harry had simply spent his day reading through his first year materials once again and it was well after midday before Harry even remembered that today was his Birthday. He dismissed the knowledge almost as soon as it came to him as completely insignificant; there wasn't exactly anyone who would be concerned about his birthday within the household, and it would be years before anything changed legality wise.

Seven-thirty arrived much sooner than he would like, and with it came the screeching of his Aunt. "Harry!" Her shrill tone cut through the silence that otherwise occupied the house. "Get down here! Hurry up!"

Harry descended the stairs and entered the kitchen to find himself greeted by a magnificent feast composed of a single slice of stale feeling bread and a slice of cheese. He looked at the 'meal' and shook his head with distaste. He briefly considered complaining to see if he could exploit her recent change of attitude and 'persuade' her to give him something more substantial but quickly dismissed the idea as trivial and wolfed down the pitiful meal the Dursleys had provided him.

The moment he was finished Petunia grabbed his plate and urged him out the door "Upstairs! Come on, Quickly now!"

Harry had only just reached the landing when the doorbell rang; glancing down the stairs he caught sight of Vernon glaring at him, as if daring him to attempt to head back down. Chuckling softly Harry headed into his room and was quite startled when he found he was not alone.

**-=S-S=-**

Harry glared at the creature currently perched upon his bed. It was a humanoid little thing bearing a comically large head and a pair of gigantic bulging eyes. He distantly thought that it looked like some kind of caricature of a children's character gone horribly wrong.

The low bow it greeted him with did little to endear the pillow case wearing creature to him.

Deciding that if it had managed to get into his house undetected it was likely at least somewhat magical; he chose to treat it as politely as possible.

"Hello." Harry greeted the creature in a mildly confused tone.

"Harry Potter!" The creature's high pitched voice penetrated his ears painfully and he distantly wondered if it might be carrying downstairs to his "family's" guests, the creature stared at him in awe briefly before continuing in an excited voice. "So long has Dobby wanted to meet you, sir! Such an honour it is…"

Harry stared blankly at 'Dobby' debating how to interact with the being, "Well then, I'm pleased to meet you Dobby." He smiled and offered his hand to the creature and was horrified to find his greeting met by it bursting into tears. "Uh… Dobby?" The creature sniffed loudly and simply stood staring at him. Somewhat unnerved he pushed on, asking the creature "Have I offended you in some way?"

He was answered with an increased intensity in the elf's sobbing, "S-such kindness! To treat but a lowly house elf with such r-respect!" Harry ran a frustrated hand through his hair. He was completely at a loss at how to talk to a house elf, the closest frame of reference he had were his brief interactions with the Goblins, and even then he was only aware that they needed to be respected, which was clearly not going to work with Dobby if his wailings were anything to go by.

Taking a glance at the creature's rather filthy looking clothing he decided on a different tactic, he summoned up his best tone of snobbery and returned his attention to the creature. "Why are you here, House Elf?"

Dobby looked briefly startled before seeming to become more at ease than he hadbeen during the entire encounter, "Dobby is here to deliver a message Sir! A warning!" fear shone clearly in his eyes at his own words.

Harry regarded Dobby quizzically "A warning?" he brought his head level with Dobby's and looked him directly in the eyes "A warning about what?"

Dobby shrank back slightly but kept his eyes in contact with Harry's "_Harry potter must not go back to Hogwarts!_"

Harry tilted his head at the creature wondering to himself if it was being serious. The grave expression coupled with the fact its eyes had somehow grew even larger seemed to confirm this was in fact the case. Deciding to see what information he could get out of Dobby, and assuming anything subtle would probably have negative results he assumed his most commandeering tone once again and simply asked, "Why?

The house elf's eyes began watering and his body trembling. "There is a plot, Harry Potter. A plot to cause most terrible things to happen at Hogwarts! Harry Potter must not put himself in danger. He is too important, Sir!"

Harry's eyes narrowed at the response. "What are these 'terrible things' Dobby? Who's behind them?"

Harry was momentarily stunned when Dobby's response was to mouth silently for a few moments before choking himself and smashing his head into the wall rather violently, quickly collecting himself Harry once again commanded the elf, "Dobby, be quiet."

The creature turned to him mumbling incoherently to itself about masters and being a 'bad elf'.

Harry sighed and tried addressing the creature again "Dobby, shut up." The creature stared up at him fearfully. "I want you to simply nod or shake your head to what I'm about to ask. No talking, no self-harm." He briefly gave the elf a look over the creature ensuring he had its continued attentions "Can you do this for me?"

Dobby's only response was a vigorous nod; Harry supposed it was taking its instructions to heart.

"Can you tell me who's doing the 'plotting'?" A shake of the head answered. "Can you tell me what the 'plot' is?" Another shake of the head followed. "Can you tell me any details about the dangers I need to avoid at all?" Further head shaking answered, deciding on a final question Harry asked, "Can you tell me when it the plot begins?" Another negative response answered.

Harry sighed exasperatedly at the complete lack of information. "What exactly do you want from me then?" Dobby answered by waving his arms animatedly making incomprehensible signs with his oversized hands in silence. Harry rubbed his temples in annoyance and let out yet another sigh. "You can speak now, Dobby."

Dobby's entire face lit up at being once again permitted to speak. "Oh thank you sir!" The glee quickly faded from the creatures face when he remembered he'd been asked a question "Harry Potter must not go back to Hogwarts!"

Harry looked at Dobby accepting that he would get nothing more from the bizarre creature in his room "Sure Dobby, I won't go back to Hogwarts." His words came out slow, as if talking to a misbehaving puppy.

He watched mildly amused as happiness flooded onto Dobby's face at his words. "Thank you, Sir! Thank you!" The creature was bowing in an almost frenzied manner, his pillow case robe swishing loudly at the sheer speed of the bowing. "You shan't regret this, Sir! I is so glad I could helping the great Harry Potter!" and with a final flurry of bows he popped loudly out of his room.

Harry simply stood staring at the spot Dobby had vanished from pondering its words and general craziness. The distant tittering of his Aunt's fake laughter floating up from downstairs brought him back to reality rather sharply. Slumping down on his bed he pulled a random text book from his trunk and muttered to himself. "At least the Dursleys didn't see Dobby, crazy little elf…"

**-=S-S=-**

August rolled around without any real changes within Harry's home life. He was rather pleased to find that Dobby never bothered contacting him again, apparently having believed his declaration of not returning to Hogwarts. He was genuinely curious as to who had arranged for the Elf to harass him. Dobby hadn't exactly been very successful - at least not outside of its own head - and he really didn't see the creature randomly deciding to 'assist' him by smashing its head into a wall and shouting a lot. Then again, maybe he was just overestimating house elves and they were all that crazy. Harry hoped dearly this wasn't the case, a race of magical creatures composed entirely of Dobby was possibly the most frightening thing he could imagine.

Being locked up in his relative's house had finally started to get to Harry, so he decided to stay the remainder of the holidays in Diagon Alley. He had to admit that the conversation with his uncle arranging that with his 'family' had went a lot smoother than he'd ever expected….

_Uncle Vernon was lazing around watching TV, it had been a week since the Masons had visited and he had been in disgustingly giddy mood since, clearly he had decided the entire night had went wonderfully._

"_Uncle Vernon." Harry said as he approached the man._

_Fear briefly flickered across his Uncle's face at the sound of Harry's voice, Harry briefly wondered if having his entire family living in fear of him would stop being amusing. "What is it, boy?" His tone was venomous and his face was a disgusting mix of anger, fear and a sickly purple colour. _

"_Could you take me to London tomorrow?" __T__omorrow was a Saturday, the 8__th__ of August__, t__hree weeks remained before he'd have to head back to Hogwarts._

_A long glare answered him, he watched interestedly as his Uncles face pulsated rhythmically. "If I must, Boy, are you going to want to be coming back?" Harry could almost taste the desperate hope in the man's words._

_Harry smiled at the man serenely. "Not until next June, I hope."_

_The change in his uncle was quite sudden, the anger and fear were gone replaced with a look of disappointment. It took the man several long seconds to realise that although he would not be permanently rid of the child, he would be almost a year without him, the man's disappointment was quickly replaced with a devilish grin. "Of course I'll take you to London, Boy!" the smile briefly faltered "But don't expect to any money from this family. No you've taken quite enough from us, Boy!"_

_Harry simply kept his smile fixed in place, he hadn't expected a single penny from the Dursleys, they horded their money like a pack of goblins. "Of course not, Uncle Vernon." He turned and left his uncle whistling happily to himself._

He was pleasantly surprised when his uncle had simply dropped him off near the Leaky Cauldron, he had proceeded to check himself in for the final three weeks of the summer holiday, it was surprisingly cheap lodging for being so close to Diagon. He had found it was a much nicer way to spend his time in Diagon than in the Dursleys, he'd ended up spending the majority of his time simply sat outside of Flourish and Blotts reading various books.

He'd asked the manager of the branch for a list of the last four years' worth of defence against the dark arts text books with any recommendations into which was the best for learning practical defence rather than theory, he had a decent collection of more advanced works already stowed at Hogwarts but they were hardly consistent complexity wise. He was handed a copy of a book entitled "Practical Defensive Magic and Its Use against the Dark Arts" which had some wonderfully useful full colour moving diagrams and the book "A Compendium of Common Curses and Their Counter Actions." along with the list he had requested.

The books were rather nice and he found himself wishing he'd had access to them over the rather pitiful theoretical material that Quirrell had assigned for his first year, it made him curious if he would have to suffer another year of the man's teaching or if he would finally quit. He'd been gradually growing gaunter and sicklier looking as the year had dragged on, he certainly seemed to want to interact with him less by June.

The only downside to his time spent on the alley, outside of the general public's occasional bad reaction to him, was the complete lack of practical magic use. Although he had expected it, he'd certainly heard more than enough warnings about not using magic from the Hogwarts staff, full time immersion in the magical world made his own lack of casting all that more grating. He longed to hex the idiots who chose to point and stare.

Within a week of arriving he received a copy of his Hogwarts letter informing him that he needed a copy of "The Standard Book of Spells, Grade 2" along with a number of books by one Gilderoy Lockhart. He'd seen rather obnoxious adverts up in Flourish and Blotts during his numerous return trips and from some skim reading of his books had decided the man was mostly a sensationalist, he doubted he actually had the skills to back up the various claims within his books, even if they did seem to be pretty accurate in the methods used when cross referenced.

Having finally received his letter he found himself incredibly disappointed in the materials he would be requiring, he already had grabbed the first four grades worth of "The Standard Book of Spells" and so felt almost resentful as he left his relatively comfortable room in the Leaky Cauldron to visit Flourish and Blotts, solely with the intention of buying Gilderoy Lockhart's narcissistic collection.

**-=S-S=-**

Not much happened during the last two weeks of the holidays excepting a minor confrontation between the Weasley and Malfoy families. Apparently the Malfoy elder had made some rather offensive comments about the Weasleys associating with so-called 'Mud-bloods' and Ron Weasley's father, Arthur he had read, had simply thrown caution to the wind and slugged him one. He couldn't help but feel the patriarch of the Malfoy family had likely deserved it.

Other than the mild excitement of the fight, there was the ridiculous signing event in Flourish and Blotts. Lockhart had proudly announced his appointment as Hogwarts' Defence Against the Dark Arts professor with his trademark dazzling smile firmly in place and brighter than ever. The news had left Harry of two minds; on one side the man seemed to have a solid history in defence, on the other… He was a gigantic ponce.

He simply hoped that the man would at least prove a competent instructor where Quirrell had not.

**-=S-S=-**

September the first rolled around and Harry arrived at Platform Nine and Three-Quarters feeling rather unenthusiastic about the year ahead. His first year within the magical community had hardly left much of a positive impression of the magical community on him. Sure it was still better than the Dursleys, and he at least seemed to have a decent amount of money in his coffers… But that was not really saying much, considering he was basically an unwanted orphan boy before Hagrid had revealed his paternity.

It had turned out that the general wizarding public took to hating him like a fish to water after a couple of defamatory articles over the last year. He hadn't had too much of an issue while staying at Diagon, but he had a sneaking suspicion that was mostly due to Tom and the manager of Flourish and Blotts either diverting attention or outright instructing people to ignore him.

Dismissing his bitter thoughts Harry busied himself with boarding the Hogwarts' Express, he had deliberately arrived over two hours early in order to guarantee himself an empty compartment, it was certainly a better option than arriving on time and suffering through attempting to find a group willing to accept someone so reviled into their midst.

It had worked out well enough. He had claimed the rearmost compartment upon finding that it was completely empty - hardly surprising given how early he was - and had settled himself in, leaving Hedwig in her cage on the table in front of him. Feeling comfortable enough he pulled out one of the various defence books he had purchased during him time at Diagon and busied himself with its contents.

He found himself rather disappointed when nothing at all happened within the two hours before the train started departing but just as the train begun pulling away, a girl with waist-length blond hair, a rather ridiculous looking pair of earrings and her wand pinned behind her ear had entered his compartment.

He gave her an assessing glance over, expecting her to simply leave as soon as she realised who he was. He was mildly surprised when she simply smiled brightly at him and slumped down in the seat opposite him. He was quite amused when he silent girl pulled out a copy of a magazine called 'The Quibbler' and turned it upside before starting to read. He was amused right up until the moment she had seemingly realised who she was in a compartment with and had settled down to simply _stare_ at him. She reminded him of distantly of Dobby, it was rather unsettling to say the least.

A few minutes passed, each feeling like an eternity to Harry before the odd girl finally spoke, "_You're_ Harry Potter." She seemed exceptionally pleased at her announcement.

Harry was momentarily stunned into inaction but quickly gathered his wits about him "Yes, I'm Harry Potter." He paused briefly before adding in as polite a tone as he could muster, "Who are you?"

The girl's unfaltering smile widened "I'm Luna Lovegood." She paused momentarily "Are you really a 'Dark Lord in Training'?" She squinted at him expectantly.

Harry stared at the girl for a few seconds, and seeing her expression remained as radiant as ever let out a low chuckle "I'm not sure, I don't feel much like one."

"You're not sure? Hmm, well, that doesn't sound very dark of you." She paused tilting her head thoughtfully at him. "I'd think you'd know if you were Dark, I imagine it feels a lot like indigestion." She shot him another piercing stare "Do you feel indigestion?"

Harry chuckled again "I can't say I do Luna." He paused momentarily, trying to look thoughtful. "Does this mean I'm not going to be a Dark Lord?" He didn't bother to fight his emerging grin as he addressed the girl, feeling rather sure it wouldn't make a difference.

Luna looked genuinely thoughtful at the question "I'm not entirely sure." She admitted, looking him up and down as if checking him for any evident darkness. "I might be wrong." She flipped a page in her copy of The Quibbler idly. "Maybe it feels more like a migraine?" she added thoughtfully lifting her.

Harry snorted at the girl. "Tell you what Luna," She looked up at him quizzically "If I ever become the next Dark Lord, I'll write you a letter telling you what it feels like."

"Oh, please do!" She clapped her hands together in delight, flashing him a bright and genuine smile. "That would be just wonderful, Harry!" She idly brushed her fingers through her hair, only managing to make it messier than previously. "Maybe daddy could write an article on it…" She fixed him under her stare once again. "What do you think?" She was almost quivering in eagerness.

Harry simply raised an eyebrow at the girl. "An article in _what_ exactly?"

The girl gestured widely at the magazine in her hands sending one of the books Harry had left on the table between them tumbling onto the floor with a loud clunk. Luna gasped loudly looking fearfully at the book, before suddenly realising she hadn't answered Harry's question and snapping her attention back to him. "Why, 'The Quibbler', of course! My father's the editor, you know."

Harry shook his head at the odd girl's antics. It seemed he was destined to interact with crazies recently. "Sure Luna, if I turn out to be the next You-Know-Who you'll get the first interview."

She looked giddy at the prospect "Oh thank you, Harry!"

He wasn't sure if she genuinely believed he would turn out dark, or if she was just happy he'd agreed to anything at all. "No problem, Luna." He smiled at the girl brightly. She was certainly a breath of fresh air in comparison to his recent social interactions. "No problem at all".

Their compartment settled into an easy silence with Luna alternating between staring owlishly at Harry and reading her copy of "The Quibbler".

The journey passed and the silence was only broken by Luna's voice ringing out dreamily. "Oh my…" Harry stopped reading and turned to watch the girl, waiting for her to continue. Her face was scrunched up in concentration, as if attempting to work out the solution an extremely complex puzzle. "We're almost there, aren't we?" The question didn't seem to be addressed at him so he didn't bother responding. She nodded to herself and continued, "I suppose I should start changing then…" He didn't get a chance to respond to her observation as she had immediately started pulling off her top. Freezing momentarily, Harry stood briefly transfixed as the topless girl rummaged in her own trunk before a loud screech from Hedwig caused him to gather his wits and flee the compartment.

He stumbled into the next compartment along in the train to find it full of redheads and himself immediately greeted by one of the Weasley twins. "Why if it isn't You-Know-Who-Two!" The twin who had jumped up swung an arm around his neck and guided him towards the seat he had just vacated, sandwiching him between himself and the other half of the duo. "Such an honour it is to have you here my Lord!"

Harry groaned at the twins' antics. He liked the pair well enough, they hadn't taken the various rumours about him that had ended up floating around at all seriously; they had even helped him through some bad times in his last year. He still he wasn't sure if the constant jokes about being 'The Littlest Dark Lord' and 'You-Know-Who-Two' were either alienating him further or endearing him to the rest of the Gryffindors. "Hey Fred, George" he nodded at each of the twins entirely expecting the next line out of their mouth.

"You wound me, My Lord! I'm Fred!" The older boy grinned at Harry, entirely aware of how sick the boy was of their shtick after enduring it so many times.

Harry simply sighed in response. "Whatever, guys." He turned to look at the third redhead within the compartment and was mildly surprised to see that the twins were seemingly spending the trip with their younger sister. The girl currently seemed to be trying to shrink as far away from him as possible while still staring at him wide eyed. He met her eyes and was amused to see them widen even further. "Ginny, right?"

A frantic nodding and what may have been a squeak were his only answer before the twins rounded on him again, he wasn't sure if it was for his or Ginny's benefit.

"Don't worry about young Ginevra here!" George pulled him towards him using the arm still wrapped around him rather awkwardly, upon his finishing Fred grabbed him and yanked him away from George towards him. "She's just not used to being around such regal company, My Lord!" The twins loosened their grips on him slightly "So, young Harry, what got you rushing into here in such a hurry?" George's tone had become mildly serious, "Your Slytherin serfs rebelling again?"

Harry gave the pair of twins an odd look, here they were genuinely worried when he had just been fleeing from Luna, Harry couldn't help it and burst out into laughter at the ridiculousness of the situation.

The twins gave him a pair of rather startled looks at this reaction. "Alright there, Harry?" Fred's tone was genuinely curious.

"Nothing quite so serious, Fred." Harry continued chuckling lightly, "Apparently the girl who stumbled into my compartment, Luna Lovegood, doesn't know to not start changing into her robes in front of a boy."

The twins' faces lit up in glee and Harry groaned at himself stupidly giving them ammunition to use against him, George grinned at him redoubling his grip around his neck "Scared of girls, Harry?" Fred leant closer into him continuing where George left off "The one true weakness of the new Dark Lord? I'm sure the papers would pay well for this, George!" Fred rubbed his chin as if pondering "At least a hundred Galleons I reckon, then again, maybe we could auction it off to the Aurors instead?"

Harry couldn't let out an exasperated sigh. "Could you just drop this?"

The twins looked at each other and instantly fell into two mock bows and as one chanted "As you wish, My Lord."

Harry rubbed his temples in irritation at the duo. "Why are you in here anyway? I didn't expect the full overprotective brother act from you two." He gestured at Ginny who still seemed to be trying to sink into her seat and paused grinning slightly "I'd expect it from Percy, actually."

The brothers both looked quite horrified at his insinuation and in declared in tandem "How dare you compare us to Percy!"

Harry chuckled lightly at their reaction before untangling himself from the twins and addressing Ginny again "Hey Ginny, could you go see if Luna's finished changing for me?" He smiled at her and was amused to see her blush crimson before nodding and jumping up to check into his compartment.

George grinned wickedly watching his sister jump to Harry's bidding "Ah another disciple for the Dark Lord!" Fred joined in immediately "You make us proud, Ginevra!" the pair locked into an embrace awkward embrace over Harry's lap, sobbing into each other's shoulders theatrically.

Ginny flashed them a fierce glare and shouted a brief "Shut up!" at the pair before fully vanishing

Harry chortled to himself after she had left "You know, that's the first thing she's said since I got in here."

Fred grinned wickedly at him "Well you are quite the charmer, Harry!" George immediately took over "More charisma than Lockhart himself!" Fred resumed "Clearly our dearest sister was shocked into silence at your angelic form!"

Harry just sighed and was rather thankful when Ginny returned giggling slightly "She's changed." She shook her head in amusement retaking her seat. "Said she thought the 'Wrackspurts' had got to you."

Harry raised a quizzical eyebrow at her "'Wrackspurts'?" Ginny's only response was renewed giggling to which he simply shook his head and stood up "Thanks Ginny," he was rewarded with another blush but was amused to see that the brief respite from his presence had helped her compose herself, he turned and addressed the compartment as a whole "I'll see you lot around, yea?" He was greeted with murmurs of agreement from the Weasleys within and returned to his own compartment.

Within he found Luna sitting happily in the seat he had been occupying until he had fled from her, with a shrug he slumped down opposite her and finding his book still on the table resumed from where he had been before having to flee.

**-=S-S=-**

The Hogwarts express pulled into Hogwarts and Harry separated from Luna and was mildly surprised when she gave him a brief hug before running off towards Hagrid without a word. Just as with his own first year Hagrid was striding through the crowds of students bellowing loudly for the 'Firs' Years'. Harry caught the giant's eye and smiled at him brightly, Hagrid returned it jovially and waved at him before ushering the first years away down the narrow path to the lake.

Harry swiftly climbed aboard one of the numerous carriages that took all other years to the castle and was promptly joined by several of the higher year students. He didn't know the names of any of the students and judging by the fact they spent the entire trip to the castle in complete silence, pointedly avoiding looking at him, he imagined he wasn't going to learn them any time soon.

The castle looked as impressive as ever, light flooded out of the many windows lighting it up beautifully. Harry was immensely thankful to be back. Even though the general student population didn't seem to have warmed to him at all during the summer, his love of practicing magic easily overrode any upset caused by their hostility.

Soon enough they arrived at the castle proper and the group of students that had been in the compartment with Harry quickly separated from him. He was left to head into the great hall alone. He entered paying special attention to the staff table and was amused to find that Lockhart seemed to be harassing Professor Snape, while the other lecturers looked on with expressions ranging from outright amusement on Flitwick to outright disgust on Snape's behalf.

Harry was not looking forward to the man's defence instruction, he'd read through the 'textbooks' they had been issued and had noticed a distinct lack of actual spells. Mostly the books were simply several hundred pages of glorifying his feats with the occasional reference to various obscure spells he did not go into the technical aspects of. Granted when Harry had looked them up himself their effects had in fact matched up with their usage in the book, but he was still worried that the man would somehow end up worse than Quirrell, a feat he had previously thought impossible.

The sorting began without much fuss. The first years were all led in by McGonagall and the sorting hat placed within the centre of the great hall. Just as with his year the hat immediately burst into song. He noted with mild interest that it was not singing the same song as it had the previous year, but assumed that as a sentient hat it mustn't really have that much to do outside of writing songs.

Professor McGonagall cleared her throat loudly regaining the attention of the first years from the Sorting Hat. "When I call out your name, you will put on the hat and sit on the stool until it sorts you." She explained to the first years. "When the hat announces your House, stand up and immediately take a seat at the appropriate table." There was a brief pause as she read the first name on the list.

"Anders, Sarah!" The tiny girl stepped forth trembling almost comically as she approached the hat. He really was amazed at how intimidating the hat seemed initially, he was quickly shown by the students of Hogwarts there were far scarier things within the castle walls than a fate deciding hat.

The rip on the hat opened wide and let out a shrill chant of "Hufflepuff!" A round of applause rose and the girl scarpered across to the Hufflepuff table, the occupants of which immediately moved to allow her a seat.

Harry watched the procession of students mostly in silence only really noticing a boy named Colin Creevey who toppled off the stool upon the hat screaming "Gryffindor!" and the girl Luna, from the train, being sorted into Ravenclaw. The end of the sorting drew upon them with McGonagall's shout of "Weasley, Ginevra!" Harry found himself smirking when the girl seemed to forget her fear of the hat simply to glare at McGonagall.

Harry had stopped paying attention as soon as the girl had stood, assuming that it was a foregone conclusion for the girl to end up in Gryffindor with the rest of the Weasleys. He only took note of what was happening with the girl when the silence in the hall dragged on for several minutes. Harry was genuinely intrigued at this, the only other person he knew of who had taken so long to be sorted was himself.

Several more minutes dragged on and murmurings started to rise around the hall, from the mutterings Harry discovered he was not the only one who had matched up his own sorting and Ginny's. A loud cough from the staff table emanating from a stern faced Dumbledore silenced the Hall after the mutterings had begun to grow too loud.

Harry had taken to watching the Weasley girl's expression, it was rather telling of the discussion going on within her head. Expressions of fear, anger and pride flashed across the girls face, synching up with the mental conversation going on within her head. Rather abruptly her face paled and she looked as if she was about to be ill, Harry took this to mean the conversation was reaching a conclusion she was not going to be fond of. He could relate all too clearly to this and found himself worried on the girl's behalf for what was about to happen.

The hat's brim opened wide and screamed "Slytherin!" The hall instantly plunged into silence and tears began to cascade down the girl's face. Harry couldn't help but be disgusted at the all too familiar reaction. He supposed a Weasley in the house of the snakes was almost as scandalous as the Boy-Who-Lived's presence within Slytherin.

There was a distinct lack of action from anyone within the hall; everyone simply stared transfixed at the now openly sobbing Weasley girl. Growling in disgust Harry stood and strode across the hall, gathering the attention of the entire room in the process, took the girl by the hand and guided her to the seat next to his own all while glaring at those gazing at him with their ridiculous slack jawed expressions.

Dumbledore, seemingly gathering his wits, stood and with magically enhanced volume cleared his throat causing everyone's attention to snap to him. "Welcome!" The man's grandfatherly tone felt distinctly at odds with the atmosphere within the Hall. "Welcome, to a new year at Hogwarts!" He smiled warmly around the hall, "Please excuse me from so delaying your meal," An extravagant wave filled the plates around the hall with mountains of food. "Tuck in!"

And tuck in they did. They just also stared at Harry and the girl now sobbing into his shoulder. He matched the stares sent in their direction with a glare of his own, causing most who fell under it to look away. The feast passed in a flurry of whispered conversations and pointed fingers, Harry was not surprised in slightest, but couldn't help but be filled with renewed disgust at the general attitude of the Hall's populace.

He could only pick out a half dozen or so Gryffindors who were not joining in with the gossiping and gawking, the other Weasley family members were amongst them, as were Hermione Granger and Neville Longbottom. The twins in particular were sending him meaningful glances that told him they would want to speak after the feast. Percy simply stared sadly across at Ginny, occasionally voicing harsh words to the various groups gossip-mongering at the Gryffindor table.

Ron looked simply distraught; Harry suspected he was suddenly looking at his abandonment of Harry the previous year in a very different light right now. He could understand the boy's reasoning for what he had done, or rather failed to do, but their potential friendship was a bridge that had been very thoroughly burnt by this point.

The rest of the feast passed in mostly the same manner with Dumbledore giving his standard speech about the forbidden forest and reminded them of Filch's ban on joy, as well as stating Quidditch trials would be taking place next week. Harry was simply thankful that he hadn't attempted to start a rendition of the 'school song'.

Ginny had barely managed to eat a few mouthfuls of food during the entire feast and was looking rather pale when the house filtered out. Upon a Slytherin prefect's call for first years she made to follow and was promptly stopped by Harry's hand taking hold of hers.

"You don't want to do that." Harry's tone was deadly serious "I very much doubt you'll get much of a warm welcome in our dorms." Ginny simply stared wide eyed and fearfully at him. "I believe your brothers want a word too." Harry gestured at the twins who were making a beeline for them through the departing crowds.

"Harry." The twins were unusually solemn in tone, he completely understood why.

"Don't worry." He knew what they wanted "I was going to do it anyway." He looked disgustedly around the hall and the pair of twins simply gave him a respectful nod and promptly left for their own dormitories.

Ginny fixed Harry with a shockingly potent glare, "What were you going to do anyway?"

Harry was amused at her sudden show of bravery, "Give you my protection."

The simple statement caused an expression of fury to well up on the small girl's face "What? I don't need your protection."

Harry fixed her with a glare of his own "Yes, you do." He saw her attempt to continue her ranting and promptly brought out his wand and cut her off with a _Silencio_. The fury on her face grew several magnitudes and he couldn't help but be mildly impressed by her determination. "Listen, Ginny," he started walking out of the hall gesturing at her to follow, she didn't even notice that he wasn't immediately following the other Slytherins.

Ensuring she was in fact following he continued "Slytherin is _not_ a nice house, as soon as you set foot within the walls of the common room you will be preyed upon." Ginny's footsteps faltered slightly at the revelation but her expression remained fierce "The simple fact is, you are a Weasley." He stopped promptly in the hallway, leaning against a wall next to a rather ugly painting of a goblin. "You are a mud-blood lover and a blood traitor. You are a target for anyone who has anti-muggle sentiments or anyone who wishes to impress those with them." Harry paused and met her eyes "That's pretty much every member of our wonderfully noble house, excluding myself and select others." He didn't go into any details about the 'others'.

Harry muttered a spell to remove the silencing charm on the girl and continued, "You basically have two choices here." He held up a single finger to illustrate his point, "You can be under my protection and spend most of your time actively avoiding your house mates." he paused raising the other finger "Or you can attempt to find another member of the house who would offer to protect you." He brushed his hands through his hair as if collecting himself "It is _extremely _unlikely that any of the others offering you 'protection' will not want _something_ in exchange."

Ginny interrupted him quite suddenly "And _you_ don't expect _anything_ from me?"

Harry grinned at the girl "Well, I am a Slytherin." His face turned serious "I'll never ask for anything you are unwilling to give or do." His face grew stern "The other Slytherins would not be so kind, especially in years to come."

Ginny looked at him somewhat confused "What do you mean?"

Harry simply sighed at the naivety of the girl, so like his own upon entering the house of the snakes. "You are a _girl_, Ginevra" he chuckled at the angry blush that appeared on her face upon his use of her given name. "Boys and girls do certain _things_ when they get older."

Harry had to admit he felt rather ridiculous lecturing this girl on something he himself had no clue about a year ago. It was taking all his will power to fight his own blush over the subject matter. "Some of the boys who would help you would be simply delighted to _make_ a lovely little blood traitor like you do various _things_ with them."

Ginny's face had become rather pale, she didn't understand the full implications of his words but she had certainly caught his emphasis on the word 'make'. "I… I see." She took a deep breath and looked at him, "And what do you want from me in return for your…" She paused, distaste clear upon her face "Protection?"

Harry simply smiled benevolently. "Train with me for one," his smile grew somewhat wicked "Extort your brothers for another." He dropped the smile "Other things. Nothing too bad, I promise you that much."

Ginny simply eyed him thoughtfully "I don't really have a choice do I?" She slumped down onto the floor against the wall next to him, she stayed like that for several long minutes before starting speaking again, "I'm going to be toy to some Slytherin regardless of what I do." She looked up at him blushing slightly, "I'd rather be the Boy-Who-Lived's than some other bland snake's toy."

Harry simply chuckled extending a hand to help her up which she accepted graciously falling in step behind him as he led her to the dungeons. A thought entered Ginny's mind upon realising they had been separated from the other Slytherins "We don't have the password." She had heard enough from her brothers to know forgetting the password to the common rooms was a grave mistake.

Harry looked at her blankly. "Some of the articles you'll have seen on me are more accurate than you'd think."

She tilted her head at him slightly "You're really the Heir of Slytherin?"

Harry laughed at her question much to her chagrin, "No, not quite, but I am a Parselmouth"

Ginny frowned not really seeing what he was getting at, "How does that help us?" Harry felt glad she hadn't recoiled in horror at the revelation.

"Salazar Slytherin was a Parselmouth; pretty much anything within the dungeons will listen to a command in Parseltongue." He smirked to himself slightly "It's rather helpful."

Ginny went rather wide eyed at the implications, suddenly understanding why her brothers must have wanted to ensure Harry was going to help her. She frowned at her line of thought. "Did you arrange this with my brothers last year?"

Harry's answer was immediate "Yes." Noticing her rather confused look he continued "The twins joked about it, the great Dark Lord Potter taking on their little sister as his 'evil wench', when she inevitably ended up in Slytherin." Seeing the rather murderous look on the girl's face at the term 'evil wench' he hastily added. "Their words, not mine." Clearly the twins had been quite the educators to the young girl in derogatory terminology.

They stopped rather suddenly at a blank stretch of wall and Ginny was momentarily shocked to hear a long string of hissing emanating from Harry, though she quickly collected herself. The wall promptly shifted revealing a long stone room with numerous green lanterns hanging from the ceiling and a large fire crackling under an extravagant mantelpiece.

Harry led them into the room gesturing briefly for her to be silent. It didn't take her long to see why; numerous Slytherins were glaring at the pair murderously. She immediately noted that it was mainly the male populace doing so and felt bile rising in her throat when she realised the truth behind Harry's earlier words and edged closer to Harry until she was literally pressed against his side.

They crossed most of the common room without fuss before a snobbish voice rung out from the silence "Claimed yourself a Weasley whore have you, Potter?" Draco Malfoy stood in an archway leading away from the main common room area flanked by Crabbe and Goyle. Ginny felt Harry tense next to her at the boy's words. Malfoy continued, "I suppose you got her on the cheap, I doubt her filthy mud-blood loving parents could afford to be picky about who got their daughter."

Harry turned to face the insult flinging Malfoy heir and smiled at him "Hello Draco, it's been a while." He paused having lazily drawn his wand from his pocket. "It seems you've forgotten how things work in here." An evil smirk appeared on his face and his tone became rather hostile "Shall I remind you?"

Fear flooded Malfoy's face as Harry hissed out an indecipherable command to the room. Ginny was rather startled to see several stone serpents uncoil from the archway above Malfoy and wrap themselves around the two brutes guarding him, Draco himself had been sensible enough to dodge away from the stone constructs and was eying them absolutely terrified.

Harry strode towards the frightened boy totally bypassing the Crabbe and Goyle who had frozen up completely upon contact with the stone serpents. Harry levelled his gaze upon Draco "This is _my_ domain Draco. You may very well all hate me, but you would do well to remember just _who_ the Praselmouth is." The statement was directed at the common room at large as well Draco. "You all had your fun last year but now," he gestured meaningfully at the magical serpents that had answered his commands "Now, I know what I can do here**."**

He stood and returned to Ginny silently leading her towards a rather large painting of the Slytherin crest opposite the hallway in which Draco stood cowering. Harry idly hissed back into the main room, recalling the serpent constructs to their resting places. Satisfied he then focused on the painting in front of him, starting a conversation with the snake within.

"_Greetings, Derleth."_ The words came out as but a hiss to Ginny, who was stood fearfully behind him watching the common room as a whole, she felt dirty under their gazes and longed to leave already.

"_And to you, Harry." _The serpent uncoiled in its frame_ "I see you have been having fun with your housemates" _Derleth's tone was one of immense amusement.

Harry met the statement with a chuckle _"Indeed I have." _Harry turned checking on Ginny who was clinging to his robes with a single hand, he was almost sure she had no idea she was doing it_ "Derleth, I have a request." _He glanced back at the girl clinging to him once again assuring himself that she was fine._ "I need you to allow access to your rooms for the girl behind me whenever she requests it."_

Derleth hissed slyly in response _"Taking a mate so soon? How… I__mproper." _Harry mouthed silently, grasping for a response, the serpent hissed out a low chuckleat the boy's antics "_Tell her to speak the word 'copperhead' in her own tongue whenever she wishes to enter, this will not work for any but her." _The serpent paused and asked Harry _"Do you want to give her access to all the areas you __can access?"_ at his affirmative nod the painted serpent paused for a few seconds, coiling around itself idly as it worked its own brand of magic, a brief glow encompassed the portrait and Derleth hissed _"The word will open any Slytherin door for her."_

Harry grinned at the creature in thanks. Ginny having full access to the Slytherin quarters, regardless of what the password was set to, could avoid numerous potential issues in the future. The prefects had certainly delighted in getting him locked outside during his first year. Harry hissed out a final _"Thank you," _and taking Ginny's hand in his spoke to the painting again,_ "Open." _The painting swung open revealing a rather large, extravagant bedroom into which Harry led Ginny.

Harry instantly felt more relaxed within his private sanctuary and smirked mischievously at Ginny. "It's a good thing your brothers aren't in Slytherin; I doubt they'd approve of me taking you straight to my bedchambers."

Ginny didn't even register the comment, widened eyes taking in the room before her. An exceptionally large double bed acted as the centrepiece of the room, being fitted in a set of luxurious looking green bedding. A large trunk lay near the bed which she assumed belonged to Harry. The edges of the room were mostly littered with bookshelves which seemed to be rather sparse with the exception of those closest to the bed. Unlike the main common room there were several rather large sofas in place of the high-backed chairs and a rather large table. Two large doors led off into side rooms at least one of which she assumed was a bathroom.

Harry glanced back at her while heading to his trunk and busying himself emptying it. "Right, you have two options." He began stacking books on the shelf nearest the large bed. "You can either share my room, or you can risk staying with the female Slytherins." Ginny looked at Harry fearfully and he let out a sigh, "I'm not going to do anything to you, Ginny." He paused for a second, "The Slytherin girls however…"

She let out a breath she didn't know she was holding and answered him rather hesitantly "I… I think I'll share with you." He had been helpful thus far, and she suspected he was correct about the other girls, this along with the respect her brothers had showed him left her feeling as if she had little reason not to trust him.

Harry nodded at her "You'll have to go and get your trunk, Hogwarts seems to know where I stay but your things will be in the Girl's dormitory." He pulled out his wand and turned on her "The female dorms themselves are warded against the opposite gender so I can't escort you…" he flicked his wand in her direction while chanting '_Serpensortia_'. A rather large black serpent automatically coiled itself around her neck leaving her frozen and pale.

Harry simply chuckled at the girl and hissed at the serpent. _"Strike anyone who tries to harm her,"_ he paused as if considering _"No lethal bites."_

The summoned snake simply did the closest thing it could to a bow and hissed out a _"Yes, master"_

Harry looked at the fear struck Ginny and sighed, clicking his fingers in front of her face to regain her attention. "Hey."

Ginny stared back and mumbled back a "Hey." in a slight stupor.

"The snake will attack anyone who attempts to hurt you, head down the right hallway where Malfoy was," He paused, "You know who Malfoy is, right?" She nodded once in response so he continued, "Assuming the female dormitories are the same as the male ones, which they likely are, there should be a door marked for first years. Your trunk should be in there, pick it up and head straight back here. The password 'copperhead' should open any magically locked doors you encounter"

The girl nodded and with a look of determination departed out the painting. Harry smiled to himself, the girl needed less work than he had expected. He busied himself with unpacking his things while he awaited her return.

It did not take her long to collect her things and she had returned without issue within ten minutes. Apparently the display with Malfoy had terrified the first years and with Ginny apparently having Harry's favour, the girls in the dorms had literally fled from her presence. It didn't exactly bode well for the future classes she'd be having with them but it had worked in her favour for the time being.

Seeing her enter again Harry turned to her "You can use anything over there for your stuff" he gestured to a chest of drawers in a desk and various nearby bookshelves. "The bathroom is in the room on the left there, training room's on the right." He nodded in the direction of the doors.

Ginny looked up at him expectantly "You mentioned training me earlier…"

Harry nodded and walked towards the heavy door on the right tapping it with his wand. The door lit up brightly, an intricate pattern of runes spreading across its wooden surface before swinging open. The room within was extremely simple, nothing but rough stone walls and a plain tiled floor. "The room's heavily warded against spell damage." He led them in and, door clicking closed behind them, turned wand drawn to the far end of the room and bellowed "_Expulso!_" a loud explosion sounded at the end of the room sending dust flying towards the pair at the doorway. Ginny immediately noticed the walls had lit up in the same way the door had upon Harry's touch.

"It's practically impossible to damage any of the walls or have a spell escape the room as long as the door is shut and the wards active." Harry gestured vaguely at the rippling runes upon the impact point of the spell. Ginny simply nodded looking rather impressed at his display of spell work.

"Within the Slytherin dorms you will be relatively safe, most of the more ornate looking carvings and statues are actually magically enchanted to respond to a Parselmouth. This room apparently was the original head of house bedroom," He paused smirking "Apparently Salazar decided anyone without the ability to talk to snakes was unworthy of entrance, so Snape has his own room separated from the students. I imagine he prefers it that way." Ending his brief tangent he returned to the original subject "Outside of the dorms you are rather vulnerable." He led them out of the training room and back to one of the sofas in his main chambers. "If you aren't in the direct care of a teacher you are a target for most houses."

Ginny looked rather confused at his words "Most houses?" she had never really heard of any fights outside of those between the Slytherins and Gryffindors.

Harry let out a snort "You're a Slytherin, a snake. The other houses basically consider Slytherins as a united faction," his tone turned rather severe "you will be an easy outlet for any anti-Slytherin sentiments amongst the other students." He snorted "And don't worry, there's plenty of students who are anti-Slytherin. You are of course, in the unique position of being a Slytherin Weasley." He looked her directly in the eyes "You are not going to have much fun here, I'm afraid."

Ginny slumped in her seat lowering her head into her hands, clearly seeing the truth in his words. "Great…" It was but a moment before she regained her confidence and looked up at him fire burning in her eyes "When can we start training?"

Harry chuckled lightly at the girl's enthusiasm. She hadn't even started her formal magic training and already wanted to play at duellist with him. "Tomorrow." The words came out more enthusiastic than he had expected.

The girl smiled at him radiantly. "Great! I can't wait to start!." Harry noticed that she was eagerly fingering her wand. And examined it briefly, it was rather scruffy looking matching much of her luggage.

He looked up at her worriedly "Is that a new wand?" his question came out much harsher than he intended.

Ginny blushed scarlet and hid the wand in her robe pocket "No, I well… I couldn't afford one after all the Lockhart books" She looked thoroughly ashamed at her confession "It was my great gran's".

Harry frowned; it was rather unlikely she would be able to reach her full potential without a wand that had chosen her. He briefly pondered his options. "I'll buy you a wand." The girl looked up at him startled and immediately started into a tirade about not being a charity case before being promptly hit by a silencing spell.

Harry glared at the girl, he knew she wouldn't like charity but he was hardly going to let her go crippled. "You're getting a wand Ginny, if you don't have your own wand you'll spend half your time struggling against that one." He observed some of the anger fade from her face but saw she was still clearly furious. "If you really want to, you can pay me back after Hogwarts, or whenever you have the money. It doesn't matter really." He paused briefly, "I'll talk to Snape and attempt to arrange a trip to Diagon Alley this weekend." He noticed she had a clearly raised eyebrow at the idea of asking Snape for anything and he couldn't help but laugh, "Snape may be a bit of a wanker," She giggled silently at his words mouthing the words 'a bit?' at him causing him to chortle slightly before continuing, "but he's good to his own house."

She seemed to accept his words and briefly think on them before attempting to ask him a question. Naturally nothing came out of her mouth due to the silencing spell still being in place. Seeing her gesturing at her mouth angrily, Harry lifted the spell from her following it with a hastily muttered "Sorry..."

"Can I still start training with you tomorrow without a wand?" The girl's hopeful expression caused Harry to smile brightly at her.

"Of course," He said cheerfully, "Anything you master with that wand should be much easier when you get your own." He briefly glanced at the large clock stood nearby. "We should get to bed," he stood up walking towards his drawers next to his bed and took out some sheets which he tossed at her, hitting her rather inelegantly in the face. Harry let out a snort at the girl's angry sputtering. "You can get changed in the bathroom, take any of the sofas you want." He paused and glanced at her before heading into the bathroom and calling out "Or use the floor if you really want to."

Ginny watched the boy's retreating back thinking upon the day's events. Apparently Harry Potter was a lot nicer than the image painted in the Daily Prophet, even if he was still a bit of a prat at times. Ginny smiled to herself, it seemed she would survive being in Slytherin at least. Even so, she cringed at the thoughts of the inevitable drama that would come from her mother hearing the news her only daughter was a snake. She smiled to herself silently and began to arrange her bedding to allow her to get some sleep.

**-=S-S=-**

**Updated: ****  
**03/02/11 19:30 GMT

Revised entire chapter, no plot changes, lots of formatting and errors corrected. I have to admit I am pretty disappointed in myself for not noticing a 'past' in place of a 'pass' in the very first paragraph of the story, hardly beginning on a high note, was I?

**Author's Note:**

I feel I may have overdone the initial veiling of Harry's house alignment and underdone the actual revelation of his house, but otherwise it turned out alright if longer than I had anticipated. I am aware Ginny is not the awkward blushing mess of canon but in this she has been subject to a significant amount of anti-Harry slander through various sources, it would be quite the crush killer. I considered utilising "§" or some other non-standard character to indicate Parseltongue, but decided against it in the end, I may go back and change this if I feel the need.

As always reviews, alerts and favourites are greatly appreciated. Please don't hesitate to leave comments about things I need to fix or overlooked.


	2. All Is Crimson, All Is Bright

_She found herself strewn naked upon the ground amidst a circle of stones within a decaying countryside. Snakes slithered across her flesh, forked tongues flickering and caressing her bare flesh, hissing their dirty promises of power and wish granting into her ears._

_Ever so slowly, a humanoid figure arose from the throng of serpents blanketing her world. it stared down upon her naked form, its red eyes so glowing with power and contempt. A serpentine tongue emerged from the figure's maw. "Obey me." The silver tongued devil demanded. Its sulphurous breath descended upon her, the foul cloud eroding the slithering cowl of snakes so embracing her. The being's head swayed so rhythmically and she watched entranced. _

_Without thought promises of servitude flowed readily off her tongue now so dispossessed of any sanity or reason. The God's maw expanded endlessly into a toothy grin and snapped forth, engulfing her. In but a moment she knew only __darkness._

**-=S-S=-**

Ginny awoke in a cold sweat to the pitch black of her new quarters, images of serpents and half recalled clandestine whispers flittering at the edges of her barely coherent mind. Bile rose in her chest and she rushed into the bathroom heaving dryly over the rim of the toilet. Rising, she splashed her face with cold water to dispel the sleepiness still clinging to her and headed back into the main room.

She was greeted by a rather worried looking Harry dressed in elegant looking emerald pyjamas. She idly noted that they matched his eyes, feeling somewhat foolish for it.

"What's wrong?" She was mildly surprised to find his face and tone full of genuine concern.

"Nothing, really, just a nightmare." She shuddered slightly and in barely a whisper added "Snakes."

Harry nodded sympathetically at the girl. The Slytherin dorms certainly had a certain air to them, one that could play with your head at the best of times, never mind after a day like she had yesterday. He was quite concerned by the fact that her nightmare however seemed a lot more potent than any he could recall having, if her utter lack of colour, trembling and sweat drenched night dress were anything to go by. He turned and walked over to a desk pulling a small shimmering crimson potion from within one of the compartments. "This is a Calming Draught." He explained handing her the bottle.

Without missing a beat she pulled the cork out, smiled up at him thankfully and downed the contents of the bottle. She allowed herself to savour the feeling of the potion beginning to take effect before getting a quizzical look on her face. "Where'd you get this?"

"I brewed it over the summer," he gestured at the still open cupboard in the desk he had retrieved the draught from, one which was still packed with various potions. "I needed something to do at home, I couldn't exactly practice spell work in a Muggle area."

She wandered over to his collection of potions and idly picked up a few glancing at their labels. "I'm impressed!" She knew all too well how tedious it could be to brew number of 'simple' potions from her Mother's own attempts at them going horribly wrong from the slightest of errors.

He smiled at her, happy in both the praise and at the fact the Calming Draught seemed to be having an immediate effect. "Hopefully Snape won't be as much of a git to me now that I have a better idea of what I'm doing." He paused brushing his messier than usual hair out of his face. "I had a lot of problems getting started in potions." He said idly, "Snape's booklist is pretty advanced compared to the other magical schools. I've been working a lot from Durmstrang's booklist. They start out with simpler material than Hogwarts in a few areas, potions and defence being the most notable." He walked over to the bookshelf nearest his bed and picked out a couple of text books tossing them over to her.

She read the covers and raised a quizzical eyebrow at him, "Potions for the Simple-minded?"

"What can I say?" He grinned at her, "I guess all potion masters have a little bit of Snape in them."

She snorted and began flipping through the next few books, narrating their titles as she went, "Magical Defensive Techniques for Beginners, Transfiguration Tips and Tricks," she paused frowning at the last book she had in her hands and looked up at him rather expectantly "An Introductory Guide to the Dark Arts?"

He eyed her warily, assessing her reaction to the book, he'd mainly gave her it to gauge her reaction but she wasn't giving anything obvious away with her body language. "Quite the mouthful of a title, don't you agree?" Still glimpsing nothing from her he supposed he'd have to give up on the indirect route. "What's your opinion on the Dark Arts"?

"They're evil." The reply was automatic and came without thought. Ginny looked up at him and frowned upon noticing the rather dirty look he was throwing her. Thinking about it, she was reasonably certain he'd used dark magic last night. She hadn't really thought anything of it at the time, the snake summoning had certainly stopped a few angry looking Slytherin girls making a move on her when she'd entered her dorms with it coiled around her neck.

She'd always been told the Dark Arts were the stuff of childhood nightmares, spells that exclusively robbed you of your mind, body and soul. The spell he'd cast to summon the snake had certainly not stolen her soul as far as she could tell. She couldn't help but wonder if there were other Dark spells that were different from those focused around torture and killing that her childhood tales had warned her of.

She furtively glanced back at Harry, feeling a bit foolish, "They can be evil. But they don't have to be?" The words came out as a hesitant question but upon seeing harry nodding at her reply and she felt herself relaxing slightly.

"True enough." he crossed the room and sat himself down next to her. After shifting slightly to get comfortable, he began to speak to her in a lecturing tone "What you need to keep in mind is that a large number of dark spells are not actually dark but simply dangerous."

He paused, pulling out his wand in a repeat of last night called forth a long black snake with a flick of his wand and a muttered incantation.

"Take 'Serpensortia' for example, it simply conjures a snake. That snake is given an order based on the casters intention." He paused, idly hissing at the snake which then began to spiral up around his body before settling around his as it had the previous day with Ginny. "The problem is, if you're not a Parselmouth, you can't tell it to stop."

He lowered his arm allowing the serpent to spiral down it and across onto Ginny's lap, who began petting it almost automatically.

"If you're angry when you use the spell, you may order the snake to kill without really intending to. And if you can't tell the snake to stop or manage to dispel it in time, you've just murdered someone." He paused to briefly watch the serpent in Ginny's lap. He was quite amused to find it completely enamoured with her and hissing happily at her every touch. He was pleasantly surprised at her taking to snakes so easily, it would make helping her that much easier. "It's hardly a 'Dark' spell. It was pretty commonly used for pest control before it started to be branded as dark magic" 

She smiled at him weakly before looking back at the small stack of books she had been thrown. She reached across and took out the 'An Introductory Guide to the Dark Arts' book and began flipping lazily through the pages, skim reading as she went.

The book was full of every type of spell imaginable. There were reams and reams of spells listed along with what they were for and notes on when and why they had been branded 'Dark' in various countries. A large portion of the spells were quite violent, to the extent she could see few redeeming features for them, but a few spells branded as 'Dark' in Europe were things she had been taught were minor hexes or inconveniences. She was surprised to find that Harry had marked off a couple of the spells marked as illegal outside of formal duelling in France were taught in Defence in Hogwarts itself in later years.

She eventually came across a number of later dedicated to what the tome had labelled as 'True Dark Arts'. These chapters mainly focused on spells of purely malevolent nature, she felt mildly disgusted as she thumbed through some of these chapters. The pages focused almost entirely on spells designed purely to aid in the act of killing or inflicting fatal injuries on others as well as those that heavily affected people's mental and bodily states. Several of the pages depicted elaborate rituals designed to enslave or ensnare others to do the bidding of the users.

She tossed the book aside, not entirely sure what to make of it at this point. "So, why'd you give this to me?" she turned and gazed at him expectantly.

He simply gave her a wry smiled in response. "The Dark Slytherin stereotype is truer than you might expect."

He paused and glanced at her to ensure he had her attention before he continued "I doubt you noticed, but not a single muggle-born ended up as a Slytherin." He frowned slightly at his own words "It's hardly surprising, given the general animosity within the house towards them. The chances are that would literally have to endure seven years of borderline torture."

He leant forward steepling his hands in front of his face and staring distantly in front of him "Almost all of the pureblood Slytherins know a few pretty damaging curses upon their arrival at Hogwarts. If they don't, they either find themselves a 'mentor' in the older years to teach them or simply find the materials to teach themselves some. I know Malfoy bragged about his father having him learn 'Serpensortia' on the day he got his Hogwarts Letter, he thought it was a delightful present, and I know for a fact several of the others in my year knew a variety of basic curses." He paused momentarily, eyes glazing over. "Really enjoyed their cutting curses…"

He trailed off into silence, leaving Ginny somewhat confused as to how to continue. She left him to his own thoughts for a few minutes before she hesitantly reached out and placed her hand upon his shoulder. She was awarded with a violent flinch and Harry spinning around to face her, looking absolutely terrified. Desperately attempting to calm himself he slumped backwards limply, resting the back of one of his hands across his eyes. "Sorry about that…"

She looked at the boy feeling rather fearful of her own housemates, if this was the reaction remembering the curses of his housemates had evoked in Harry, what could they do to her? She was nowhere near as powerful as Harry afterall. She briefly squeezed his shoulder again and was rather surprised to feel his hand take hers in his and cling to it somewhat desperately.

It took several minutes for him to fully regain his composure, feeling somewhat more relaxed he gently shook his head at his loss of control, before resuming speaking. "Right, the Slytherins." He ran a hand idly through his hair collecting his thoughts. "You shouldn't have as much trouble as I did in my first few months, it took me until Christmas to realise I could even get in here. It turned out the library isn't a very good place to hide from people who want to curse you. And there isn't anywhere to hide in a shared dorm." He chuckled bitterly at his own words.

"It's pretty much a given the Slytherins will attempt to harm you." He grinned rather ferally at her, "They aren't going to do it within the common room because of obvious reasons. They won't go for an outright attack but you're likely to get hit by the odd spell in the corridors between classes. How damaging the spells will depend on who decides to try and mess with you." He stopped looking at her meaningfully, "I want you to keep one of my summons with you until you get better at defence."

She nodded automatically, seeing no real reason to deny his request.

He smiled at her acceptance and continued with his lecturing. "The majority of the other houses' members aren't going to be out to do real harm to you. The 'puffs are the least likely to actually attack you but a few of the more disgruntled ones might try and take their frustrations out on you if you look like an easy target. You shouldn't have any trouble with them really." She nodded prompting him to continue. "The Gryffindors mostly go for humiliation over real damage. Stuff like the Jelly-Legs and tripping Jinxes."

"The Ravenclaws are a mixed batch. Mostly they leave the other houses alone but a lot of 'claws have been bullied by the Slytherins in the past. There are more than enough members of the house who'd happily take their petty revenge on you for being a slytherin." Suddenly remembering his summon he glanced across Ginny's form and was pleased to see it was happily coiled around her neck, quite asleep.

"It's pretty stereotypical but from my experience the 'claws are fond of learning obscure or difficult curses. Most of them are easily fixable, but several of the older claws I've seen to dabble in the dark arts. They're quite willing to use almost anything on you if they think it's justified and that they can get away with it." He chuckled to himself humourlessly. "Luckily, the large majority simply don't care about anything going on outside their own house." He paused, adding "Except Quidditch" as an afterthought.

Giggle laughed, grinning at him "I can understand that."

A sudden thought occurred to her and she looked at Harry frowning. "Who am I supposed to support? I don't think the Gryfinndors will appreciate me cheering for my brothers."

Harry laughed at her words, "I don't really support any of the teams, I tend to hide during the games"

Ginny looked at him quizzically "Hide?" she smirked "Where on earth can the Boy-Who-Lived hide at a Quiddich match?"

He grinned at her shrewdly before finally releasing her hand, something she found herself mildly disappointed about, and crossing the room to his trunk and pulling out a rather flowing silvery-grey cloak. He returned to his seat next to her and looked at her with a serious expression on his face. "You can't tell anyone about what I'm about going to show you."

Sensing the severity in his tone she nodded and with a determine expression told him, "I won't tell a soul."

He looked into her eyes briefly before nodding, seemingly accepting her words at face value. Without a word he draped the cloak over her legs and told her to "Look down." in an expectant tone.

She did as instructed and was shocked to find her lower half had completely vanished from view. Rising she headed to the closest mirror and began experimenting with covering various parts of herself looking on at her reflection in awe. "A real Invisibility Cloak…" She looked across at Harry and saw him smiling across at her.

"It is rather nice," He leant back in his chair closing his eyes wearily, the early hour beginning to get to him. "As long as you don't mind spending the matches under that with me, you needn't worry about people reacting badly to you."

She smiled at his words and returned to her seat next to him, pulling off the invisibility cloak and depositing it on his lap. "That'd be nice." A mischievous smile grew on her face "Do you think we could sneak in to watch the Gryffindor practices?"

Harry let out a brief snort at her idea "No problem. But the twins tell me their captain Wood is insane, I don't really want him attempting to gut me alive for stealing his plays."

Ginny giggled at the words, she'd heard plenty of stories from the Twins during the summer of being woken up at the earliest hours of the morning to practice. "Maybe just matches will be fine."

Harry rose and dispelling the snake he had summoned spoke to her "Get back to bed. You're going to need all the rest you can get before tomorrow morning."

She nodded silently and returned to the sofa she had picked out the previous night and lay in wait of sleep overtaking her.

**-=S-S=-**

Before Ginny knew it she was up, dressed and in the main hall waiting for her breakfast. Harry had awoke her much earlier than she was used to but sitting here as the hall filled with people pointing and whispering at her he appreciated the few minutes of blessed silence arriving early had offered her. The constant flow of smaller reactions was certainly preferable to having the entire hall gape at her if she had come in later. Apparently the Weasley family was much more well-known than she had believed, that or her brothers had made a bigger name for themselves than she had heard, and the fact that the youngest and only female Weasley was the one who had turned out to be dark was quite a novelty.

The fact Harry had seemingly 'claimed' her was also fast becoming common knowledge, she had lost count of the number of people who had pointed at her as they passed whispering something in hushed voices. In fact it was only Harry's presence and support that was stopping her from exploding in rage at someone. Seeing him so calm made her feel less obliged to snipe back at those whispering about her. It also helped that he seemed to have developed an instinctive knowledge of when she was close to losing control; he had calmed her several times with but a word or touch.

Time passed excruciatingly slow for Ginny and it felt like decades had passed by the time one of the Slytherin prefects came around to hand out the class timetables. It turned out she had 'Defence Against the Dark Arts' with Lockhart first thing followed immediately by Charms and Double Potions with the Gryffindors after lunch.

She noticed Harry peering over her shoulder at her timetable and rose a quizzical eyebrow when she saw he was grinning at her "What are you grinning at?" her tone was extremely defensive.

Raising his hands to her as a sign of peace he began "You get to experience Lockhart first." He grinned wickedly at her. "I hope you'll tell me about the experience later."

She was somewhat confused about his reaction, from what she'd heard Lockhart was an amazing man with a lot of experience, granted it was almost entirely from her mother who fancied the pants off him. "What do you mean? Lockhart's a great man!"

Harry simply shook his head in amusement as a response. "I just have a feeling he's not going to live up to his books." He glanced across to the teachers' table meaningfully where Lockhart had his arm draped around Flitwick's shoulder and was animatedly telling him a story, the sour expression on the professor's face spoke volumes about his opinion of the man. Harry chuckled at the sight, "Not going to live up to them at all."

**-=S-S=-**

Ginny arrived at her first class without incident after following a few brief directions from Harry. Breakfast had been a gruelling affair, the whispered did not die off as she had hoped but seemed to be fuelled with every interaction with Harry. She had spied her brothers sending stern looks or underhanded spells at several of the Gryffindors who had been loudly bad mouthing her for succumbing to Slytherin. Harry had assured her that within a few weeks they would be mostly used to her.

She had taken a seat in the back corner of her DADA class where she felt least likely to be noticed. She almost wished she had Harry's invisibility cloak. She was exceptionally glad that Harry had insisted upon her taking a summoned snake with her to her classes until she learnt more defence, several of the older students had gave her some quite venomous looks only to back down fearfully upon catching sight of the snake coiled around her neck. She dumped her rather haggard copies of Lockhart's books on the desk and waited for the Professor to arrive attempting to ignore the snickers of the other students at the quality of her books. She was feeling rather at the end of her leash and at this point hoped harry would teach her a good hex or two to use on all the idiots who were constantly gaping or laughing at her.

She was interrupted from her internal musings by one Gilderoy Lockhart striding into the room head held high. He perched himself lazily on the front of his desk and cleared his throat loudly for the class. After several moments silence fell across the room and giving the class a winning smile he reached for one of his books stacked on everyone's desks and held it up to the class showing off the portrait of him on the cover that was posing dramatically next to an image of what seemed to be a vampire.

"Me." He pointed at the cover and winked at the class as a whole. "Gilderoy Lockhart, Order of Merlin, Third Class, Honorary Member of the Dark Force Defence League and…" A huge smile overtook his face almost comically, "five-time winner of Witch Weekly's Most-Charming-Smile award." He paused dramatically and Ginny wondered just how many times he'd been through this routine before. "But I don't talk about that. My smile didn't earn me my Order of Merlin afterall!" He looked around the class beaming. If he was fazed by the fact no one was returning his cheer he didn't let it show.

Not one to be put off by the attitude of some bratty Slytherin's Lockhart instantly resumed his 'teaching'. "You, of all Hogwarts students, are the highest honoured amongst the students here," his tone had turned from cheerful to quite dramatic and Ginny noticed that a few of the student's interests were piqued momentarily. "You are the first students in the entire history of magic to be taught by, myself, Gilderoy Lockhart!" There were several audible groans at the proclamation which Lockhart deftly ignored.

Smiling genially around the room he returned the book he had grabbed from a desk in the front row and headed to the chair behind his desk. "Now then! Open your copies of 'Voyages with Vampires' and turn to the first page!" He flipped open his own copy smile widening, "You, my dear students, have the rare opportunity of an hour of narration with myself!" He smiled around the room, looking as if he had just exposed a great secret of the universe to them. "Be sure to keep up!" Groaning herself, Ginny grabbed a quill and prepared to start scribbling down the man's words, feeling somewhat distantly annoyed at Harry for being so very right about the man.

**-=S-S=-**

Both of Ginny's first two classes passed without much incident DADA turned out to literally be an hour of Lockhart reading out from his book while they scribbled down extra notes when prompted. Charms class however was mildly interesting; they hadn't started any true practical work but had begun to practice various common wand movements, it was certainly a lot better than listening to Lockhart talk about how wonderful he was.

The brief break between lunch and her charms lesson found Ginny in a corridor with a group of fourth year Slytherins, as soon as she took a step past them she felt an immense pain erupt in her back She found herself wracked in agony and had crashed hard onto to the floor in an instant. The snake Harry had left with her was instantly towering high above her fallen form, letting out an endless string of hisses, ready to strike down anyone who approached. The group of fourth years next to her at the time had instantly fled upon her being struck by the spell and thus there was no one around who had witnessed the act when Snape descended upon her.

"Miss Weasley I do hope there is a good reason as to why you are lying on the floor wrapped in what appears to be a highly venomous snake." His tone was as snide as she had come to expect from stories shared within her family.

She rose from the floor slowly and painfully, the snake around her neck relaxing slightly, she rubbed her back still feeling extremely sore. "Yes, Sir." She panted for breath after forcing out her words and upon regaining her breath continued. "I was hit by a spell from behind, Sir." She paused wondering if she should bother telling the man the snake was Harry's, as it turned out she didn't have to.

"Am I to assume the snake belongs to one Mr Potter?" She was rather shocked to find the man sounding almost amused upon asking the question.

"Yes Professor, it's his." He gave her a curt nod and drawing his wand cast a wordless blue spell upon her. She instantly felt the pain recede in her back and gasped out a brief "Oh!"

Smirking Snape spoke once again "'Oh!' indeed." He flicked his hand and his wand vanished instantly from her sight. "Do you have any idea who may have cast the spell?" His tone was strict and expectant.

"No professor." She paused seeing a piercing look in his eyes "They attacked from behind, Sir. There were some of your fourth years nearby who may have seen whoever cast the spell but they fled as soon as I was hit."

Professor Snape's face twisted into a rather ugly scowl and muttered mostly to himself "Fleeing from their own, pathetic." He gave her another sharp look and continued "Well then Miss Weasley, I advise you to head to the Nurse's office, she should be able to provide a salve to more properly treat the pain."

She nodded at the man gratefully, recognising his 'advise' as the disguised command it actually was. "Thank you, Sir." He nodded at her curtly acknowledging her before turning to leave, his cloak billowing behind him. She watched him leave, briefly wondering to herself if he really just wore such a flowing cloak for dramatic effect, before heading in the direction of nurse's office as she was advised.

**-=S-S=-**

When Ginny finally arrived in the last fifteen minutes of lunch she was rather surprised to find that the hall was extremely subdued. As she approached closer to the Slytherin table she was startled to find that the usual 'rift' across the table double the size of that morning's leaving Harry much more isolated than they had been previous nights and the breakfast this morning.

It did not take long for her to realise why, she could practically feel the rage rolling off Harry as she approached him. Feeling somewhat unsure of herself she simply placed a hand on his shoulder momentarily and sat down next to him. His head snapped up to face her muttered a meek "Hi."

Relief washed over Harry's face upon seeing her "You're alright!"

"Yea, I'm fine. Why were you so worried?" She paused tilting her head quizzically at the table around them "You seem to have terrified that lot" She gestured behind her with a brief wave.

"Snape told me, and I quote, 'The Weasley girl has been attacked by an unknown party and is currently at the hospital wing.' He didn't clarify, the Bastard." A low growl escaped his throat with the word. "What actually happened? Snape made me think someone managed to hospitalise you on your first bloody day."

She frowned at his words wondering why Snape would word it like that when he clearly knew she was not that badly injured. "Someone hit me with a pain curse, 'Doloriactum' I think Madam Pomfrey said, Snape found me and cast a relief spell on me and sent me to the nurse."

Harry swore under his breath and a look of realisation rose on his face "Snape was messing with me." He looked across to the staff table and was met by the sight of Snape smirking at him mockingly. "Is this Snape's idea of a joke? I guess anything's possible." He shook his head at the ridiculousness of the situation. "We're going to Diagon on Saturday. Snape's going to find a prefect to escort us."

"Can we trust the prefects?" Ginny asked in a rather worried tone.

"Snape will be using monitoring charms. It'd be pointless to do anything if it would instantly be detected." He paused and grinned at her. "We'll be taking a snake along anyway."

She nodded before asking "Does the 'snake' have a name?"

Harry shook his head at her question "I've not named it." He paused "Feel free to suggest one if you can think of a good name for it."

Ginny smiled at the snake draped over her and gently stroked it before immersing herself in a conversation with Harry about his experiences with Snape and the other Slytherins.

-=S-S=-

Ginny's first potions class rolled around and was a quiet affair. Snape begun by taking attendance, his eyes flickered briefly over to her as he read her name but otherwise he made no move to recognise that he knew who she was over any other Slytherin. Snape moved around the class assigning partners and upon reaching Ginny assigned her to a boy named 'William Harper' who completely ignored her outside of grunting yes or no.

For their first potion Snape assigned them a simple boil cure potion and upon scribbling the instructions on the blackboard looked across the room and barked out a harsh. "Begin!" The potion itself was rather easy, the Harper boy basically followed her every order seemingly terrified of the snake that lurked just out of sight within the arms of her clothing. In the end Ginny and Harper's potion was one of the few to be completed, luckily there were no disasters like the one Harry had told him of Neville Longbottom melting his cauldron and causing horrific boils to completely cover him.

The hour passed mostly in a tense silence, Snape awarded four of the Slytherin pairs points for making a usable potion and only managed to find fault with the potion of a boy named 'Colin Creevey' and a girl named 'Natalie McDonald' which had somehow ended up a horrific neon green colour after their brewing efforts. Snape drew the class to the close and gestured for Ginny to remain behind as the other students began filtering out for dinner in the great hall.

"Yes Sir?" She attempted to sound as polite as she could, feeling somewhat sickly both from being detained and having spent so much time lingering around fumes within the dungeons.

"I've arranged your trip on Saturday with one Percy Weasley, he volunteered after hearing about the trip through McGonagall somehow." His smirk gave her the impression it was more due to his own manipulations that she had ended up with her brother than any stroke of luck on her behalf. She felt mildly worried about the upcoming event; she still wasn't entirely sure how Percy was really reacting to the news of her being in Slytherin.

She nodded politely at the potions master "Thank you Sir, I really appreciate you arranging this."

"I could hardly let one of my Slytherins run around with a half working wand could I?" He let out a soft snort of derision "I do not wish you to bring shame upon this house as your brothers do Gryffindor" She felt anger flash through her as he turned and stalked off towards his office door "Be at my office at six fifty Saturday morning, you will be flooing to Diagon Alley at exactly seven." Opening his office he gave her a brief glance of contempt and let out a snide "Don't be late." before closing the door behind him.

**-=S-S=-**

The trip to the Main Hall proved uneventful but Ginny found herself constantly glancing over her shoulder. She came to the tables before Harry had managed to arrive and was somewhat entertained when she found that the Slytherin table had still made an automatic parting around where he usually sat. She sat and started her meal without ceremony, the silence around her feeling oppressive. She felt stupid and weak for it but she was feeling rather desperate for Harry's company and couldn't imagine how he had managed to tolerate all this for a year without any help.

It was ten minutes into the feast when a rather tired looking Harry appeared beside her with a weary "Hey."

She looked at him with a concerned look on her face "What happened to you?"

"Herbology, apparently there's a rather large Devil's snare in one of the closed greenhouses. Attacked me when I snuck in to grab a pair of pruning shears as there were _somehow _none left in the main greenhouse." His tone left no doubt as to what he thought had really happened.

She smiled at him sympathetically and simply continued eating. After a couple of minutes of comfortable silence she decided to tell him of Snape's words. "Snape said that my brother Percy's going to take us to Diagon on Saturday, we have to be at his office at six fifty in the morning to meet him and then we'll floo across."

"Great. You need anything other than a wand?" He stifled a sudden yawn and looked at her expectantly.

She shook her head in response "No, not really."

"'Not really'?" His tone was surprisingly harsh.

Her eyes widened slightly at hearing the tone and she hastily asked "Will I need anything else for training?"

He let his vision travel across her before answering "Do you have any durable clothing?"

She felt herself blush feeling his eyes on her "Uh, I," She stumbled on her words somewhat flustered. "No, I don't think so." It was true enough; most of her clothing was either homemade or second hand, hardly stuff designed to hold up to stress.

He nodded at her seemingly satisfied "We'll pick you up some properly reinforced robes and clothing then." He paused, eyes flickering to her "Should help stop any more of that happening." He finished while gesturing meaningfully at her back. She felt somewhat humiliated at his casual mention of her injury.

Before she had a chance to say anything she felt his hand on her shoulder and looked up at him, her eyes wide. "Never feel embarrassed about what others will do to you."

His eyes and voice were full of passion and she found herself automatically nodding determinedly. "Thank you" The words escaped as but a whisper.

He smiled at her encouragingly "We'll start your training after we eat." He chuckled as her head whipped around in his direction to stare in rapt attention. "I was hoping no one would bother you for a while, but you've already been hit by a pretty complex curse."

She grinned at him sheepishly. "Sorry."

He rolled his eyes at her apology "It was hardly your fault Ginny, people are dicks." She let out a snort and he continued "You ready to go?"

She nodded silently and together they headed to their quarters.

**-=S-S=-**

Four hours later Ginny found herself sweating profusely in what used to be a simple pair of muggle jeans and a relatively thick t-shirt. Harry had wasted no time in ramping up her training, apparently she had managed to learn 'Protego' faster than he had and 'Expelliarmus' almost as fast, while having the added disadvantage of a mismatched wand. Apparently Harry had seen this as a cue to go absolutely bloody mental. She had spent the last hour and a half frantically blocking and avoiding everything that he could think of to throw at her, she'd been hit by flames, constricted by snakes, sliced by cutting spells and had been hit by a variety of minor hexes that would have made the twins jealous.

Rising from the wall against which she had found herself slumped she sent a glare in Harry's direction "You're a bloody nutter you know."

He grinned mischievously at her and simply said. "I do try." She couldn't help herself and found herself grinning back at him. "Let's stop for the night." His words caused her to sigh in relief.

"About fucking time, I'm about to collapse." She growled out in a manner totally unfitting her size and age.

He smirked at her "You've been becoming increasingly foul mouthed as time's gone on, you know?" She growled at him levelling her wand at him threateningly. "Easy there Gin," He raised his hands placatingly, "I'd hate to see what the twins would do to you if you killed their dark lord."

She simply tilted her head at him in response placing a finger thoughtfully against her lips "You know, I don't think your 'protection' is going to help me much." He raised an eyebrow at her in response to the comment and waited for her to continue. "I'm pretty sure I'm going to end up murdering you before the year is out."

He chuckled at her, opening the door to the training room for him and gesturing for her to pass. "You can use the bath first then. It's the least I can do to ease your bloodlust."

She shook her head at him smiling slightly and headed straight to the bathroom, shouting behind her "I guess you can live, for now."

He let out a brief laugh and shouted after the departing girl "What you think of your training so far?"

He heard a brief snort come from the bathroom followed by a cheeky shout of "Training? More like bloody torture!"

He grinned to himself. Ginny had pleasantly surprised him, she'd managed to mostly match his pace despite having no real prior experience with duelling or combat spells. He supposed having to deal with tormenting older brothers had uniquely prepared her for the experience of having spells endlessly flung at her, that or she was simply a natural.

Dispelling his thoughts he shouted back at her "You did well, really well!"

In the bathroom Ginny found a huge smile fixating itself on her face at the compliment. She honestly had no idea what level he was expecting her to live up to but was glad to have met it. She was rather proud of how well she had managed to perform.

Harry had told her that both '_Expelliarmus_' and '_Protego_' were generally second or third year spells, with _protego_ occasionally slipping into fourth depending on the professors.

Throughout their training she had found herself continually impressed with his knowledge of spells. He had almost mastered most of the spells covered within Hogwarts up until the second year, defensive or otherwise, as well as a wide variety out of text books issued for both Durmstrang and Beauxbatons. She had at one point asked him why he seemed so obsessed with learning magic and she had simply received a silent glare that wouldn't have looked out of place on Snape in response.

She frowned thoughtfully while checking on the water level in her running bath. She had her suspicions that something awful had happened to Harry last year, his obsession with her own learning of defensive magic and his brief breakdown while mentioning cutting curses seemed to support this. She decided to simply wait it out, the reaction she received when she had attempted to pressure him about his desire to learn had been enough to make it clear she couldn't force anything out of the boy.

Stopping the flow to the now full bath she peeled off her ruined clothing and soaked herself in the hot water, letting the heat work out the lingering pains. A sudden unprovoked thought entered her mind and made her shudder fearfully, if he was working her this hard with what he himself called a 'faulty' wand, how hard would he work her when she had her own?

**-=S-S=-**

Friday arrived with only minor incidents, Ginny didn't find herself under spell fire again but Harry was the victim of a Conjunctivitis Curse which had caused him to miss his first session with Lockhart, something Ginny had been quite vocal about being envious of. Ginny had however had an exceptionally amusing flying lesson on Friday.

The Slytherin first years had been paired off with the Ravenclaws resulting in her reunion with Luna Lovegood. Luna, as it turned out, was not much of a flier and upon managing to get airborne had promptly began colliding with the other students in mid-air sending several into nosedives. Ginny being one amongst an incredibly small number who had managed to avoid being hit got the duty of keeping Luna grounded while Madam Hooch had escorted the majority of the class to the hospital wing.

The rest of the lesson had been spent in idle conversation with Luna about a wide variety of subjects ranging from her opinions on the teachers, her housemates, to her opinion on the broom she had attempted to use. During the course of the lessons she found out that Luna believed Professor Flitwick to be a cross between a Goblin, a Pixie and a Troll. She was thankfully not forthcoming with any theories on how such an unholy union would take place. She was also incredibly disappointed that no one within her house seemed to have any new information on Wrackspurts and she was almost completely sure that the reason she had so much trouble with the broom was due to a nargle infestation.

She had to admit to finding Luna a breath of fresh air amongst the students, most of the other Ravenclaws had eyed her with a mixture of contempt and fear and the Slytherins simply outright ignored her. At the very least Luna was sociable, even if she mostly talked about her insane theories on things.

Luna had also pestered her with questions about Harry, convinced that she would have some 'behind the scenes' information on the 'next Dark Lord'. She ended up rather disappointed when all Ginny would say was that he was indeed a Parselmouth and that he seemed to use the ability benevolently. She had shown Luna the summoned snake that she carried with her that day to illustrate her point and was pleased to see that Luna was rather taken with the creature, fussing over it and petting it for the rest of the lesson's duration.

She had left Luna with promises of meeting her with Harry in tow to potentially give her some tips on any spells she might be struggling with, she wasn't really sure how to react when Luna had stated in a rather giddy fashion that it would be 'just like being friends!'.

**-=S-S=-**

Saturday morning rolled around much sooner than Ginny would have liked and she found herself being awoken by Harry. Today was the day she'd be receiving her new wand, something Harry enjoyed stressing the importance of, as well as getting some proper clothing for training. She glanced at the pile of clothing that she had been wearing during training for the last few days, both the pants and t-shirt she had been wearing were ruined, numerous holes and the tell-tale blemishes of spell damage lined the articles. She almost regretted using the pair of jeans she had chosen as disposable, they might have been haggard but they were comfortable, and now neither they nor the shirt would ever be suitable for anything but use as rags again.

Yawning she pulled herself off the sofa she'd been utilising as a bed and grabbed herself some clothes out of her trunk. Glancing across the room to ensure Harry hadn't left, she sleuthed across the room into the bathroom claiming it before he had a chance.

She was rewarded with a rather loud and crass "Hoi!" from the main room and started giggling uncontrollably.

"Ladies first, Harry!" She managed amidst before being overtaken by a fresh fit of giggles.

A cry of "Witch!" was his only response.

She busied herself with the task of cleaning herself and found herself humming tunelessly. She felt much freer than she had the rest of the week, she wouldn't have to watch for petty students firing spells at her in Diagon and she'd be able to see one of her brothers.

Out of all the Gryffindor Weasleys she had only actually seen the twins in person since the sorting, the twins were on a break at the time and naturally they had made a joke of escorting her to her charms class all while wailing mournfully about their Dark Lord spending his time with her over them.

It had been immediately obvious to her that this was the twins' way of showing that they didn't begrudge her ending up in Slytherin and that they still saw her as their sister. It also made it clear that, despite their endless mockery of Harry as a Dark Lord, they held a great respect for him. She supposed that was why they hadn't bothered checking up on her more than once, they trusted harry with her, they certainly wouldn't have approached him after the sorting otherwise.

They had also mentioned in passing that she shouldn't expect to see much of them during normal term time; they knew she was already gaining infamy for associating with Harry Potter and didn't really want their reputation acting against her.

Thinking about the twins' attitudes towards her and Harry made her come to the attitudes of Ron and Percy. She honestly had no idea what they were both feeling towards her. According to the twins Percy had been making an effort to stifle any rumours about her that arose within Gryffindor, this gave her some amount of hope for the day out, but it was still painful that he had yet to try and speak to her directly.

He could be using this weekend as a means to contact her, she supposed, he wouldn't even have to feel like a traitor to his house. She shook her head slightly dismissing the rapidly bittering thoughts swimming around her head, he was going to be spending today with her, she would see where she stood with him soon enough.

Ron's stance was somewhat clearer than Percy's. She had heard off Harry about them briefly becoming friends on the train and his subsequent abandonment of him upon being sorted into Slytherin. In one of the rare insights into Harry's first year he had told her that Ron had been quite involved in the campaign against him last year, he'd been hexed by him several times at the very least. She honestly doubted she would ever be as close to Ron as she had been in the years before he had left for Hogwarts again. As it stood she was rather dependant on Harry for her safety within her house and the simple fact of the matter was Harry would not be forgiving Ron any time soon for his previous actions. It did not bode well for re-establishing a close familial relationship.

She finished up in the bathroom, and pulled on her clothing, heading out to the main room. Harry was waiting on the other side. He gently pushed his way past her shooting a dirty look in her direction as he went, instantly retriggering her into her earlier fit of giggles.

**-=S-S=-**

Harry and Ginny arrived promptly at Snape's office at exactly six fifty and were rather unsurprised to find Percy already there. They had been informed they were allowed to wear any clothing they desired for the trip and yet Percy had opted to wear his standard school robes as well as his prefect badge despite the fact they were leaving school grounds. Upon seeing him Ginny had let out a snort and muttered "Typical Percy." to a smirking Harry.

As they approached Percy straightened and upon their arrival held out a hand to Harry introducing himself. "Percy Weasley."

Harry had simply shot him an amused look and returned the gesture by shaking his hand firmly "Harry Potter."

Nodding respectfully Percy turned his attention to Ginny and in a formal voice stated "Ginevra."

Ginny had simply rolled her eyes and with a large smile grabbed him in a hug. "Don't call me that, you git!"

A great deal of tension seemed to leave Percy upon Ginny's hug. Clearly he had been expecting the typical icy Slytherin persona to have overtaken her. He stared at her intently for a few moments, as if ensuring she was still the same sister he had before she had been sorted. "How have you been, Ginny?" a small smile had appeared on his face, apparently he had decided she was indeed still his sister.

"I've been well. Harry's made sure of that." Her words were innocent enough but the challenging glare she had fixed on him made the real meaning clear enough.

Percy turned to face Harry, their eyes met and he seemed to search within his eyes for several long moments before inclining his head slightly and speaking. "Thank you for looking after my Sister."

Harry let out a brief snort at his words "No problem." He paused, looking at Ginny and grinning wickedly "I wouldn't be too worried about her. She's a pretty formidable girl you know."

Ginny felt herself blushing at Harry's words and Percy let out a low chuckle. "That she is."

Percy checked his watch and, seeing that is was rapidly approaching seven, readapted into his usual prefect persona in preparation for meeting Snape.

He didn't have to wait long. Snape emerged from his office the very second it struck seven, cloak billowing behind him as he moved. Without a word he ushered them inside and to his waiting fireplace.

"You have until twelve to return, there will be a ten minute period before this time during which the fireplace in this office will be accessible from Diagon Alley. Should you miss the gap you cease to be my issue and you will have to find some other means to return." His tone was tinged with venom, whether his anger was directed at the hour or the fact he was catering specifically to them was not certain. Moving aside he handed each of them a small sachet of foo powder. "Remember, no later than Twelve."

Nodding silently at the potion master's words Percy took point and headed into the fireplace with a call of "Diagon Alley!" followed promptly by Ginny and finally Harry.

**-=S-S=-**

Harry's arrival in Diagon was far from smooth, having left in a haste to avoid spending any excess time in the presence of Snape he had arrived almost immediately after Ginny, this resulted in him instantly tumbling down into Ginny when he lost his balance. Ginny simply burst into giggles helping him to his feet while Percy looked on disapprovingly.

"Who knew that Floo would be the greatest weakness of Harry Potter!" She joked.

Harry answered with a scowl "I was brought up by Muggles, like I know how to use the bloody floo properly!" This only served to cause her to laugh harder at him. "Yea, yea, laugh it up."

Percy loudly cleared his throat and Ginny forced her laughter under control and asked innocently "Ollivanders first?"

Harry nodded and looked at Percy for confirmation who returned it briefly.

"Gringotts, Ollivanders, Madam Malkin's." Percy listed off their destinations monotonously "Then anywhere you want to go to kill time until we need to head back for Lunch."

Both Harry and Ginny nodded and followed him in the direction of Gringotts.

As it was Harry who was funding the shopping trip, the two present Weasleys waited at the entrance to Gringotts for Harry to go and retrieve some galleons, Percy took it as an opportunity to have a private chat with Ginny.

"So, Ginny…" He grimaced at his clearly worry stricken tone "What's it like being a Slytherin?"

"It's bad." Her bluntness made him cringe slightly. "None of the actual Slytherins talk to me and most of the other houses resent me for being a Slytherin." She gave him a meaningful look "I've been attacked once, and so far the only person I have regular conversation with is Harry."

A pained look crossed Percy's face and he mouthed silently as he searched for words that could help, coming up with nothing he settled for staring at her with a sorrowful expression on his face.

Ginny felt anger growing within her chest briefly but quickly smothered it, "Don't worry about it Percy, I'll be alright, Harry will see to that."

She watched as a conflicted look rose on his face, she half expected him to warn her of the dangers of Harry Potter, and was relieved when he settled for a stiff nod. They stood in silence for several agonising minutes in wait of Harry, Percy passing the time by stealing glances at her in a vain attempt to try and come up with something to say. Eventually as Harry emerged he gave her one last look and told her "If there's ever anything I can help you with, just ask."

She gave him a sympathetic look, realising that his words were mostly to satisfy his desire to feel important to her life. She smiled gently at him and said "I'll ask." with a firm nod.

Harry arrived to find both Ginny and Percy looking rather pleased with themselves, he assumed that they had talked out the house issue but decided not to press. Walking towards Ginny he waved to grab her attention and tossed a small bag of galleons at her.

"That should be enough for the trip."

Ginny pensively eyed the contents of the bag, and let out a muted gasp. The bag contained what looked to be around a hundred galleons, far from a princely sum, but far more money than she had ever had access to at once before.

Noticing her expression Harry ushered her and Percy away from the Bank, and in the general direction of Ollivanders, hoping to avoid the expected adverse reaction to the sum he had provided. They had almost reached the store when Ginny snapped out of her stupor.

"Potter!" His surname was snapped out in an impressively Malfoy-esque fashion as she rounded on him.

He couldn't help but cringe at the expression on her face. "Yes?" The word came out much weaker than he would have liked.

"What the hell are you doing?" She spat, one hand taking his robes the other taking hold of a wand seemingly materialised from nowhere and jabbing it at him threateningly "Loaning me this much money? Just how long do you intend to eke out my debt?"

"Calm down!" The words came out panicked, hearing Ginny simply growl at his request Harry realised he felt genuinely fearful of the small girl confronting him, raising his hands in a pacifying gesture. "Listen a second!"

Still growling she loosened her grip on his robes somewhat, Harry stared at her for a long moment before letting out a defeated sigh. "I can't win here." His words triggered her redoubling her grip on him. "You won't take the money if it's charity. If I lend you it, you'll see it as me trying to further entrap you." He sighed again, meeting the glare fixated on him "I thought we'd sorted this out already, Gin."

Fury remained etched across Ginny's features and Harry felt his own anger rising to match it "Do you really think I need to entrap you Ginevra?" His voice had taken on a cold tone "You've seen the Slytherin quarters; it would be trivial to bully an untrained first year into doing whatever took my fancy" Ginny's furious expression became slightly fear tinted. "I want to help you Ginny. As I said, you're in much the same situation as I was last year; I wouldn't let you go through that alone." His tone had shifted from the previous coldness and had taken on an almost pleading edge which served to drastically subdue her anger.

Ginny met Harry's eyes and spent a long moment mulling over his words in her mind. Letting out a sigh she lowered her wand and avoided looking at him directly "I'm sorry." She looked back at him a half-smile on her face "Going off on one about money matters is bred into us Weasleys"

He let out a low chuckled and suddenly found a pair of arms wrapped around him and heard a subdued voice whispering desperately into his chest "Please, don't abandon me." Looking down at the head of the girl clinging to him, he gingerly wrapped a single arm around her, her sudden wave of doubt and vulnerability forcefully reminded him of his own moments of despair past. Squeezing her, he whispered back "Never." After a few seconds Ginny ended their embrace, blushing slightly at her own weakness.

They spent several moments simply staring at each other before their moment was ended by Percy, loudly reminding them of his presence by clearing his throat. The pair grinned back at him somewhat bashfully.

"Now that you have your money, we need to get to Ollivanders."His voice was the same no-nonsense tone he used when carrying out his prefect duties and Harry and Ginny followed closely him as he started striding towards the wand maker's store.

The tinkling of an unseen bell heralded their entry into the wand maker's store and Ginny was shocked to find that Ollivanders as a whole was rather decrepit, endless tiny boxes coated with dust were stacked everywhere the eye could see, so immersed was she in looking around the dishevelled store that she did not notice the figure of Ollivander gliding out to wait in front of her until he spoke.

"Good morning." His voice was exceptionally soft but still caused the distracted girl to sharply jump.

"Good morning." Ginny replied, her heart pounding in fright.

He stared at the girl intently, his aged silvery eyes boring into hers "Yes, yes, the sole female Weasley. I had not thought I would be seeing you this soon." He leaned down closer to her, "Your youngest brother has yet to visit me, and your older siblings did not until later in their magical careers." His gaze flitted over to Percy for but a second. Peering even closer at Ginny he suddenly leant back before stepping around the counter towards Ginny, "May I see the wand you are currently using?" He held out an expectant hand and without thinking, she withdrew her wand and handed it over.

Mr Ollivander instantly busied himself examining it closing, turning and twisting it about in his hands and muttering to himself. "Cedar, Eight Inches, Griffin tail-feather." Seemingly satisfied he handed the wand back to Ginny who took it gratefully.

"Well then, Miss Weasley, let us begin." The aged man pulled out a long tape measure and looked at her pointedly "Which is your wand arm?"

"My Right" Her reply came out quite elegantly without but a second of thought. Her composure briefly prompted Harry to feel somewhat ashamed of his own clumsy reaction more than a year ago.

Ollivander nodded and gestured for her to hold out her arm and withdrew a tape measure from his pocket which automatically began taking measurements which he monitored silently for several seconds. As soon as the device was done taking measurements of Ginny's arm Ollivander began darting around the shelves, tentatively picking up and replacing various boxes, deciding on three he placed them before Ginny on the shop counter. He briefly glanced at the tape measure "That's enough." Instantly the tape measure dropped to the floor.

Taking the first box he withdrew a long length of wood "Try this, ash and phoenix feather, eight and a half inches long." Ginny had barely picked the wand up before it was snatched back out her hand "No, not at all!"

He handed her the next wand busied himself with re-boxing the previous wand. "Try that, Mahogany and Phoenix Ash, nine and a quarter inches" She gave the wand a brief swish and jumped badly when a stack of boxes suddenly sped towards her. Stopping them with a flick of his wand Ollivander stopped the boxes before they impacted her and moved to hand her the next wand from his collection. Ginny sighed fully expecting the process to take some time.

It took a dozen or so wands before Ginny found the right one. "Quite tricky you are, yes, not unlike Mr Potter over there." Ginny stole a glance in Harry's direction and was surprised to see him watching her quite intently. He nodded at her and she smiled back briefly before Ollivander thrust another wand into her hands. "Try this – Hazel, powdered dragon talon, ten inches, quite flexible."

Picking up the wand she immediately felt a difference from all the others she had previously handled, warmth consumed her very being and her hand tingled where it gripped the wand. She idly flicked the wand and was pleased when an explosion of green and gold sparks showered across the room.

Seeing the sparks Ollivander cried out, "Bravo! I do expect to hear good things of you Miss Weasley, yes, indeed." Ginny nodded dumbly at the man's mutterings, grinning widely at finally finding her wand. "Yes, that will be seven galleons," he paused suddenly hearing Harry clear his throat meaningfully.

"You need not worry Mr Potter. Her wand does not have a brother." Harry blinked at the old man who simply smiled at him.

"I… I see." His eyes were wide and his words hesitant. Collecting himself he asked what he had originally intended to. "Could we get her a holster too?" His words caused Percy to look at him with an unreadable expression while Ollivander simply nodded in understanding.

"Yes, yes, of course." Ollivander turned to stare at Ginny once more, his pale eyes seemingly looking right through her. "That will be eight galleons." He paused "That is to say, if you are happy with the basic holster?"

"That'll be fine." She confirmed, fishing out the required coins from the pouch Harry had provided and handing them across to the man. Taking the purchased items she took a moment to properly don her new holster and placed her new wand in it before leaving, Mr Ollivander bowing to the group as they left his store.

Ginny sidled up to Harry and whispered in his ear "What did he mean by 'brother wand'?"

"I'll tell you later." Harry whispered back, somewhat hesitantly.

Ginny simply sent him a harsh look clearly saying that she would be forcing it out of him if she had to. He didn't doubt it for a second.

**-=S-S=-**

The rest of their time on Diagon Alley was spent simply hunting clothing for Ginny and idly visiting a variety of stores, ranging from Flourish and Blotts to Florean Fortescues Ice Cream Parlor. In the end she purchased a pair of relatively light dragon scale undershirts for standard wear as well as a set of thick dragon-hide robes for her protection during training. The soreness resulting from Harry's abuse disguised as training had yet to leave her, she was exceptionally glad for the physical protection that she now had access to.

**-=S-S=-**

They arrived promptly back at Hogwarts at around eleven fifty-five, they had flooed into Snape's office from Florean's store. They were thankful to find that his office was quite empty and left rather swiftly for the main hall.

On the way there Percy kept glancing at Harry as if wanting to pull him aside and ask him something but was pointedly ignored, Harry suspected that he wanted to question him about his intentions with his sister, something he was not at all eager to go into after already having a confrontation with Ginny herself earlier that day.

They arrived without incident at the Hall and separated from Percy, Ginny pulling him into a brief hug and asking him to stay in touch, and proceeded to their usual spots at the Slytherin tables and helped themselves to some food that had already materialised before they arrived.

It didn't take long for the energy that had been building up in Ginny since buying her wand to become too much for her to handle. Almost violently she pushed away her half eaten meal and turned expectantly to Harry, "Can you teach me something new after this?" 

Harry chuckled at the girl's giddiness "Sure, as soon as you prove you can still cast everything we've already been over."

Ginny pouted at him "But, I could do them with my old wand! I'll definitely be able to do them with my new one!" she was practically vibrating in her seat with each word.

He grinned in response, "Then it'll be no problem showing me, right?"

She huffed, not liking the smug expression that had overtaken his face in the slightest "No problem at all!"

Copying her earlier actions Harry pushed his plate away and stood up gesturing her to follow him "Well let's go see if you can stand up to your boasts, shall we?"

She was on her feet in an instant and practically running back to their chambers, Harry followed at a much more leisurely pace and found himself face-to-face with a blonde girl upon rounding the first corner of the journey.

He nodded respectfully at the girl, "Greengrass." He was somewhat surprised to find her meeting him in public.

"Potter, we need to talk." Her tone was serious and caused Harry to grimace.

He raised an eyebrow at her quizzically "What's up?"

"Not here, somewhere private." Her eyes flickered back and forth along the corridors as if expecting to be attacked at any moment.

"Right, follow me then." He led her down the corridor and into a secret passage the twins had told him of the previous year, hoping Ginny would understand him being late. He allowed her a couple of moments to compose herself and then pressed "What's happening?"

Daphne's face was overtaken by a scowl "Malfoy's getting another article published, about you and the Weasley girl, it would seem."

Harry frowned deep in thought. The articles about him had dried up after a month or two last year when no one had managed to unearth any proof of him practicing dark arts. This year things were somewhat different, he had been extensively abusing at least one spell that was considered a Dark Art and had been practically flaunting his ability to speak parseltongue within the confines of the house dorms to keep the other Slytherins in check.

"When's it going out?" Harry asked.

"Tomorrow morning." She said gravely.

Harry swore under his breath, "Do you know what it says about Ginny?"

Daphne shook her head grimly. "I'm not even sure what it says about _you_ Potter," She paused flashing him a superior grin, "You may want to go prepare your charge for tomorrow, I'm sure you'll have enjoyed receiving many a howler by this time tomorrow."

Harry chuckled despite himself "I don't doubt it, thanks for the warning, Daphne. Look after yourself, yea?"

She smirked at him "Always, I'm not quite as _accident_ prone as you Potter, not yet at least."

He grinned back at her and headed back out the secret passage, sparing her a parting nod "Greengrass."

She returned it easily, a slight smirk remaining on her face "Potter."

**-=S-S=-**

By the time Harry made it back to his rooms he found that Ginny had worked herself up quite badly, he was instantly assailed with curses of both the magical and vocal variety upon entering and had to dive behind a sofa and hastily erect a shield around him to avoid injury.

"Calm down!" His words were met with a brief respite from the spell fire and he was startled to see quite the crazed look in her eyes before she slumped down slightly. Rushing towards her he put an arm around her shoulders and helped her to a nearby seat, assuming she had exhausted herself with the volume of spells cast.

"Sorry Harry, I don't know what came over me…" The words were but a whisper and her eyes were somewhat glazed over. He found himself inordinately worried for the girl.

"Just relax for a minute." His words were commanding and she simply nodded in understanding eyes slipping closed.

Shaking his head Harry began to pace the room assessing the damages, there were a few spell burns on the sofa but most of the spell fire had either been absorbed by his shield of the actual walls of the chamber. Heading to where Ginny was previously sitting he noticed there was what looked to be a diary flipped open with what looked to be the words '_**Hurt him.**_' written upon the page, picking it up he examined the book and was confused to find the words fading and that the rest of the pages were empty.

Flipping the book to the front he took note of the name 'T. M. Riddle' scrawled upon the first page. Pulling out a quill he flipped to a random page mid-way through and wrote the word '_test_' and was almost pleased to see when it faded into the book. He idly thumbed at the corner of the page supposing it must be Ginny's diary presumably charmed to hide its contents from others, the thought didn't sit well with him upon remembering the words 'Hurt him'.

Glancing back down he noticed that just below the place he had wrote his own words a simple question had appeared, dispelling his thoughts of privacy charms.

'_**Hello? Who's there?'**_

**-=S-S=-**

**Author's Note:**

Sorry for the wait, I would have liked to have got this out earlier but reality was not cooperative. The chapter is a lot longer than I had planned on it being, I could probably strip a decent amount out if I did a second pass but would rather update than do so for the time being.

The timetable in use is vaguely based off the calendar for 1993 as found on The Harry Potter Lexicon. In scanning through the actual books later I found that it did not match the books 100% but feel this is mostly a minor issue all things considered.

I fully realise the only canon cores (in regards to wands actually made by Mr Ollivander, at the very least.) are unicorn hairs, phoenix feathers and dragon heartstrings. Truth be told I am not particularly bothered, I do not intend to make a major plot point out of Ginny's wand.

Again this has not been proofed and so is likely swimming in errors.

As always reviews, alerts and favourites are greatly appreciated. Please don't hesitate to leave comments about things I need to fix or overlooked.


	3. A Dream of Crystalline Peaks & Summary

'**Hello? Who's there?'**

Harry eyed the Diary below him, a feeling of dread rising in his gut, glancing back at the now sleeping Ginny. Innumerable thoughts raced through his mind, endless theories on what the Diary was and where it came from. Dismissing his rapidly panicking thoughts he glanced down at the Diary, the words that had appeared rapidly faded, fresh ink rising up to replace them.

'**I know you're there.'**

Eyes widening he slammed the diary shut and immediately thrust it into a drawer in his potions' desk, instantly casting the most advanced locking charm he was aware of on it. He slumped to the floor, his heart pounding erratically in his chest. He didn't like this at all. He didn't think that Ginny would outright attack him, not outside of the training room at least, even if she was angry for him being late it just wasn't like her. He knew she was a bit of a hothead at times simply from spending so much time around her, but some of those curses were ones she shouldn't have even known, he had recognised several as pretty severe, capable of permanent damage in fact.

The words the diary had wrote to him also further complicated matters; the book obviously had a degree of sentience to it.

He looked over at Ginny's now prone form once again and began pacing. It was pretty likely that the diary might be holding some sort of sway over the girl's actions. The potential for manipulation with something as private as a diary was vast, diaries were something one opened their hearts to; it was an extremely worrying thought that someone may have had complete access to Ginny's heart for any period of time.

He growled slightly at his own thoughts. There was an article coming out tomorrow and Ginny seemed to have been talking to a sentient book, it was possible the two could be related. The possibilities for further sullying his reputation would be endless if all the actions he'd taken since the start of term came to light, especially with the sheer number of potential spins they could put on the information.

He paused in his pacing looking back at the girl. He had his doubts that the book had been planted by a reporter, the chances of a reporter attempting to get Ginny to outright harm him were significantly lower than those it having been planted by someone with a more malicious purpose. There were plenty of people who would be more than willing to try and pin something on the members of the Weasley family, pretty much any past or present death eater held some shreds of resentment against the light oriented family, whether it be personal or simply in out of principle.

Of course if it had been planted by someone with malicious intentions they might go to reporters anyway about whatever they discovered, the fact that Harry Potter had been teaching what some could consider dark arts to the sole daughter of the Weasleys would have certainly been interesting information to earn someone a decent amount of galleons.

There was of course always the possibility that she had simply purchased the diary herself to use totally unaware of the fact it may be sentient or capable of facilitating communications with another and this was all a terrible accident.

Deciding that pondering the various possibilities to himself was not going to result in anything positive for the time being, he decided that he better wake the girl and ask her directly. Deciding that it would be best to avoid a potentially violent situation he picked up her new wand and pocketed it before casting '_Incarcerous_' upon her, causing a number of thick ropes to bind her in place. Deciding it was likely to be safe enough he pointed his wand at her again and muttered '_Rennervate_'.

"Tom?" Her words came out panicked and fearful.

"Easy there Gin" Harry put a hand on her shoulder causing her to flinch slightly, "Harry?" She blinked owlishly "What was I doing..?" She paused frowning upon recognising the fact that she was bound "Why am I tied up?"

Harry frowned at the girl; loss of memory was not a good sign. At least she was coherent enough to ask about the ropes. "Ginny, what's the last thing remember?"

She grimaced at his question "Getting back here." She paused, hesitant to continue. It took but a glance at the sombre expression on Harry's face to get her talking again. "I was angry, angry that you were taking so long. So I started writing in my diary about you." She tore her eyes from his and spoke the last words in a low tone "…writing to Tom."

_My_ diary. Writing to _Tom_. Harry did not like the way this was sounding at all. "Ginny, how long have you had Tom, the diary?"

She glared at him "What do you know about Tom?" he matched her glare with one of his own, triggering her into continuing, apparently realising the seriousness of the situation "The diary was in one of my defence textbooks, the Lockhart ones I got second hand." She rolled her head on her shoulders stiffly, uncomfortable in her bindings. "I thought it was just a blank diary, so I started writing in it. And well, it wrote back." She looked up at him a vulnerable expression "I started writing in mid-August, he was so nice! I wrote about my worries about being sorted and he constantly tried to boost my confidence, kept telling me my family would love me no matter what…" She trailed off staring at Harry with an unreadable expression.

"He's always written back? No matter what time you wrote?" She thought about it briefly and nodded. Harry's eyes briefly flicked to the drawer he had placed the diary in, it seemed likely the book itself held the sentience rather than acting to enable communication with another. He wasn't sure if that was better or worse than the other option. "Do you remember what the last thing he said to you was?" He asked.

She looked thoughtful "We were talking about you, I was… I was complaining about you taking so long." She blushed feeling rather childish for her admission. She frowned remembering something. "He seemed angry that I hadn't written to him in so long, I think the last time I wrote was the day before the train, I've been so busy." She trailed off. "I told him about you teaching me extra defence." She looked up at him a fearful expression "He just kept writing about how I was a fool – I swear I could hear his voice – and that I should have been going to him for power."

Harry nodded. He felt like he may be poking a snake nest with a stick with his next question but asked it regardless. "Do you remember the diary telling you to '_hurt him_'?" he put emphasis on the final two words and found that Ginny looked thoroughly confused, which he assumed meant she didn't remember it happening. He gave her a few moments and was rewarded for his patience when a look of comprehension grew on her face.

"I remember, he told me to hurt you for ignoring me, multiple times. I felt like I had to do it." She shifted within her binds shivering and Harry took that moment to release them, feeling relatively sure that she wouldn't immediately try and kill him at the very least, instantly she moved into a position in which she could hug her knees tightly "It was like, I felt really happy. And there was a whispering in the back of my mind, telling me that Tom was right, to do what he told me." She curled closer into herself and Harry found himself automatically wrapping an arm around the girl's shoulders as she sobbed and shivered.

Harry glared across at the drawer now containing the diary, it sounded like it was using the _imperius_ curse on her but that was unlikely, there was every chance however that it was enchanted with some variant that acted upon anyone writing in diary. What better way to violate one's privacy than for them to let you do it of their own free will?

He shook his head in disgust. "You're not using the Diary again." He shot her a firm look, which instantly put her in mind of McGonagall.

Ginny sniffled and shuddered involuntarily. She pushed herself closer to Harry and murmured into his chest. "Yea, I don't want that to happen again." Her voice lowered to but a whisper. "I don't want Tom controlling me".

**-=S-S=-**

They ended up spending a long while in the same position, no real conversation was carried out between them, Ginny needing only the reassurance that Harry was there for her. After about an hour Harry roused Ginny from the light sleep she had drifted into in order to discuss plans for the Diary with her.

"I'm going to show Snape the diary." He noticed immediately that she was giving him a dubious look and shook his head chuckling at her. "Your family really have you convinced Snape's the devil, huh?" he grinned wickedly at her.

She blushed slightly and responded in kind. "Well in their defence, he is pretty terrible to the Gryffindors." She paused "Not quite as bad as he was made out to be I suppose, but still." She shrugged slightly.

Harry nodded conceding her point, "Yea, he really seems to enjoy taking house rivalry to the extreme at times." He shook his head remembering the various times Snape had specifically target Ron Weasley and Neville Longbottom in his own classes, granted they were the two worst students outside of Crabbe and Goyle, but it still was a pretty poor reason for borderline bullying.

Dismissing the idle tangent, Harry steered the conversation towards the Diary once again. "Snape's an expert on the Dark Arts. He may be a certified potions master too, but his true passion lies in Defence and the Dark Arts themselves." He paused, glancing over Ginny briefly to ensure he could move on to the subject of what had happened to her. "The feeling you had sounds a lot like the Imperius Curse. The problem is you can't tie the Imperius to inanimate objects, so it's either a variant I've never heard of or something else entirely."

Ginny nodded feeling somewhat overwhelmed, she vaguely knew that the Imperius was an unforgivable but she was not entirely sure on what it did. She felt rather unsettled about the fact that Harry was seemingly able to instantly identify one of the unforgivable curses from just a few symptoms.

"Why do you know so much about the Imperius?" Ginny's voice betrayed her worry to Harry quite clearly.

"I've researched quite a bit into most of the unforgivable. They're the favourite spells of quite a few of our housemates' parents," He paused a look of disgust briefly crossing his face, "I wouldn't like to be caught unawares by one of our housemates mimicking their parents if they thought they could get away with it." There was an undertone of disappointment in his voice that Ginny totally missed.

"Oh, ok." Said Ginny, finding she felt rather silly for asking at all.

"Anyway, I've had some news." Harry steered the conversation towards more important subjects. "Did you read the 'news' about me last year in the Daily Prophet?"

Ginny frowned, there'd been a period where every other day there had been an article decrying everything Potter. It had been believable enough at the time, and had certainly prompted her to reassess her blind obsession with Harry Potter. In the end she had wrote a number of letters to the various Weasleys in the school and asking their opinions of the boy.

The response she had received had been surprisingly varied between each of her brothers. Ron was convinced he was the next Dark Lord, she couldn't help but suspect he might have been one of the anonymous interviews that had apparently been carried out with students in Harry's year for the various articles.

The twins had opened with jokes about her still harbouring a crush despite him turning out evil, but had rapidly grown serious. They believed there was some serious bullying going on across all the houses, Harry had taken a rather extreme reaction to one of their pranks and had fired off numerous curses at them before collapsing in what looked to be a panic attack.

She had never brought up the fact she knew this with Harry, the twins had implied it was a highly private thing between them that was never really brought up, they had even had her promise to only mention it if she felt she really needed to, they didn't want to breach his limited trust. They had spun it off at an angle to try and imply they were simply glad to have some help with pranking the Slytherins, but the fact they had clearly grown attached to the boy was quite obvious to her regardless.

Percy had been the least useful. He had simply fired off a number of facts about him. He was Slytherin but he didn't get along with his house, most of the other houses seemed to at least hold a distant resentment towards him, and the boy had spent a startling amount of time in the hospital wing compared to most first years.

She assumed that the twins and Percy had the more accurate answers and in the end she had started questioning what she had been reading in the papers. Something that hadn't sat well with her mother when she mentioned not being sure of how accurate the articles were; her mother had convinced herself to believe the worst of the articles and had warned her to be careful when she got to Hogwarts at least once daily during the months when the articles were being published. It had god old rather fast.

Ironically enough it had been her time spent writing to Tom that had cemented the idea of making up her own mind on him in her skull, whenever she brought up the subject of Harry Potter or the Hogwarts houses Tom had simply told her that there was always more to people than their House traits. He had regaled her with stories of his own friendships with every house, the fact he had eventually revealed he was a Slytherin himself after so many hours talking to him made her hold hope of Harry being as 'nice' as Tom was.

She felt rather sickened at the fact all her interactions with him had apparently been little more than a set up towards a stereotypically Slytherin backstab, she feared what he may have had planned for her if he had managed to control her without being interrupted.

She shuddered remembering the feeling of him taking control; it had been disturbingly pleasant, almost peaceful. She grimaced internally, she imagined if she hadn't been interrupted by Harry she could have ended up writing to Tom himself about her odd feelings. Something told her she didn't want to know where that course of action would have taken her.

Of course despite her best efforts she had ended up somewhat fearful of the boy, despite reassessing him she found her mind still asked 'what if the articles are right?' when thinking about him. Regardless of her initial doubts he had quickly managed to help her feel at ease in his presence, the fact he had instantly acted to help her from the second she was sorted had went a great deal to helping with this. As it stood, she found she felt safer with him than even her brothers; it was an almost startling realisation, especially considering that he had proven several articles correct with his willingness to perform and teach her the 'Dark Arts'.

She turned to face the boy she had found herself dependant on. "They called you all sorts, basically branded you as the next You-Know-Who."

Harry chuckled "Precisely." He'd assumed she'd have seen them, but he did have most of the articles on hand, souvenirs of a sort. "I've been told there's a new one being published in the morning, an article about _both of us_."

She gave him a fearful look "What are they going to say about me?"

Harry frowned, truth be told he wasn't positive on what the exact contents of the article would be. "There's a number of ways they can spin it. They can make your family out as trying to sell their daughter to the next Dark Lord for some money or influence." He paused considering "They can make it seem like I'm manipulating you, a good and proper Weasley girl, into being my servant or whore or some such nonsense."

He paused and gave her a pointed look. "It depends on who they talked to really, chances are that it's Malfoy and his 'friends' as it so frequently was last year, you might want to warn your family that you are about to be collectively painted as immoral dark wizard sympathisers willing to do anything for money." His eyes bored into hers for several seconds before he asked the question he felt he desperately needed to, "Have you actually told the rest of your family you're a Slytherin yet?"

She winced at his directness, she had been putting it off for quite some time, the fact that her brothers had simply told her mother that her sorting had 'gone well' simply encouraging her to delay the inevitable.

"No, I've not told my parents, or my older brothers." She grimaced at her situation, she needed to contact them as soon as possible. She doubted that her mother reading about her being a snake and a whore in the papers would do much good for their relationship, especially after she had spent so much time warning her of Slytherin entrapment. She shuddered imagining the howlers she would receive.

Harry shook his head at her reaction to the idea of writing to her family, he knew her mother could be vicious with her words but she was still her daughter. "Write them a letter, my owl Hedwig should manage to get them to your parents before the paper goes out."

She pouted, doubtful at the idea of her managing to explain everything in a letter in a way that would not result in a howler, but nodded anyway. "Ok" She pulled herself up off the seat, blushing deeply, suddenly intimately aware of the fact she had woke up using Harry as a pillow.

She grabbed a piece of paper and a quill from her supplies and began writing, trying to emphasise that the twins and Percy were being supportive and that the articles were simply wrong about Harry. It took her a long while to finish what she considered a relatively mediocre letter but she supposed it would have to do, anything would likely be better than what the Prophet would be publishing. She read it through and prayed that her mother would listen to her pleadings to not send a howler, she assumed that the public and the student population's reactions would be bad enough without her mother adding fuel to the fire.

"I'm ready." Her words caused Harry to jump, he had been poring over a tome which didn't seem to bear a name, slipping in a torn piece of parchment as an impromptu bookmark he nodded at the girl. He briefly checked the time and was pleased to see they still had a few hours until curfew.

"Right then, let's head to the Owlery." Harry made for the exit and held open the painting of Derleth for Ginny allowing her to pass.

They passed undisturbed through the suddenly silent common room, not one of their housemates went to greet or disturb them, Ginny was consistently impressed with how much they seemed to fear Harry's control over the dorms with parseltongue.

**-=S-S=-**

The journey to the Owlery itself was mostly silent; Harry was in an odd mood and seemed to spend his time in a half daze pondering something unknown to her. She supposed that it was likely about the diary, she felt rather depressed about current events. Her presence had brought with it the diary which was currently causing problems and a resurgence in the press that had died down almost a year ago.

She wondered how comfortable Harry really was with the idea of another article going out, he hadn't given much away with his reactions so far and she wasn't sure how much of that was because of him focusing on her problems before his own and how much was him coping with the idea.

Upon arriving at the Owlery Harry was immediately greeted by a rather large Snowy Owl swooping down upon him and landing on his shoulder before beginning to peck him fervently. Harry simply started laughing and calling out placations to the bird while Ginny stood by watching bemusedly.

"Calm down girl, I've missed you too!" A huge grin had overtaken Harry's face upon the owl landing on him. He turned to Ginny, freshly calmed owl perching on him elegantly. "Ginny, I'd like you to meet Hedwig."

Ginny tilted her head at the owl, who was giving her reproachful look and she ridiculously found herself feeling nervous for the creature's approval. "Hello Hedwig, you're a beautiful owl."

Hedwig hopped along Harry's shoulder to stare at her and after a few seconds let out a hoot of approval.

Harry grinned widely at Ginny "Seems she approves of you, count yourself lucky." He gestured for her to come closer while idly feeding Hedwig a treat.

Harry turned to Hedwig, "Do you feel up to delivering a letter?" At her hooted response Harry smiled and gestured for Ginny to come attach her letter.

Hedwig looked expectantly at Ginny who passed across her letter. "Take it to the Burrow girl." She almost whispered, stroking the owl gently.

Harry smiled, overjoyed to see that his first real friends seemed to approve of each other. "Let's head back; we never did get around to training." Suddenly remembering the wand he had earlier pocketed, he pulled it out and handed it back to the girl "Here, I think I can trust you with this again."

"Thanks." She smiled graciously and took back the wand. She hadn't asked him about its absence upon noticing it on the way to the Owlery, fearful of him refusing to return it, she was glad to see that he trusted her again despite their earlier ordeal.

**-=S-S=-**

Several hours of training later Ginny found that she felt extraordinarily glad to have her new dragon-hide robes, Harry was going all out on her and she found herself dodging and taking hits from everything from pain and cutting curses to outright elemental magic. She was thoroughly singed, drenched, pummelled and windswept by the time their session was through. She felt even more exhausted and dirty than she had in any of their previous sessions, she found it far from pleasant experience, especially as they weren't even finished yet.

"You never take it easy do you?" She grumbled to him as he undid a particularly violent outburst of boils on her wrist.

He simply shook his head smiling sadly. "Do you think anyone who actually attacks you will take it easy on you?"

Ginny simply sighed, she knew the logic behind it but that didn't mean she had to like it. "Still, you don't need to be a bastard _every_ time."

He smirked at her "You're right, I don't, but what'd be the fun in that?"

She scowled and hit him lightly with her good arm. "Git."

An unprovoked memory came to her of Diagon Alley, he had yet to explain the cryptic remark Mr Ollivander had made in regards to his wand having a _brother_. "Hey," Harry looked at her expectantly, having finished clearing up his spell damage to her "You said you'd tell me about your wand."

Harry sighed and swore under his breath, he had been hoping she'd forgotten about that in the rush of events since Diagon. Slowly and carefully Harry began his story "When I got my wand Ollivander kept saying how it was very 'curious' that the wand ad chosen me." He paused handing across his wand to Ginny, she was shocked by the show of trust but took it gratefully. "Holly and phoenix feather, eleven inches." He paused searching his memories for the exact specifications and smiled to himself upon remembering, looking at his wand fondly "Nice and supple."

Ginny idly gave it wave and was both amazed and startled into letting out a brief 'eep' when a small number of red and gold sparks shot out the end of the wand. Harry raised his eyebrows at her quizzically, mentally filing away the anomaly of his wand seemingly accepting her before holding out his hand for it and taking it back from her.

"Apparently, the Phoenix that gave the feather for the wand gave one other, just one. It ended up in a wand of Yew at thirteen-and-a-half inches." He waved his wand lazily, sending forth the same sparks he once had in Ollivanders some twelve months ago, mentally comparing them to the ones Ginny had fired seconds prior.

"Mr Ollivander told me that he would be expecting great things from me. Apparently the brother wand belongs to Voldemort," Ginny shivered at the name but didn't protest its use as many would "He told me that he expected great things from me. Because after all Voldemort did - as Ollivander phrased it – great yet terrible things."

"You-Know-Who's brother wand," Her eyes were quite wide "I see." Ginny's look of shock quickly transformed into a pensive expression. "Would having the brother wand mean anything? I mean, he's gone right? What difference does it make if he's dead?"

Harry snorted at her words, "He's not dead, Gin. Dumbledore told me that much last year, he believes he's out there severely weakened from attacking me and biding his time until he can return to power." He paused taking in Ginny's horror-struck face, he felt someone bad for shattering her illusions on the matter but it had to be done. "Did anyone tell you about Professor Quirrell?"

Her face briefly scrunched up in concentration and after a second she nodded "The defence teacher off last year? The twins and Ron told me he was crap."

He smirked at the bluntness of her statement, "Pretty much."

"Apparently he managed to get himself killed while seeking a 'rare artefact' that was hidden within Hogwarts last year." He stopped running his hands through his messier than usual hair, the result of the intense training he'd been putting Ginny through. "I'm not sure why Dumbledore felt the need to tell me, I guess he was worried Quirrell had been corrupting me or something. He pulled me aside on the first day of classes and told me that he believed Voldemort had agents within the castle and that Quirrell was believed to be one. He also asked me if I'd had any private contact with Quirrell outside of lessons."

He snorted at the idea, the noise saying everything that needed to be said. "He told me that he'd been killed whilst trying to gain access to a certain artefact within the school, one that could have rapidly sped up Voldemort's recovery." He shook his head at the idea of keeping an artefact of that much importance in a school full of children. "He assured me it had been destroyed and then wished me luck in the coming year." He shook his head at the odd behaviour of the old man.

Ginny had stayed silent for the duration of Harry's brief tale, she looked at him with fearful eyes, "So is that why you're doing so much learning? In case Voldemort comes back?" The very idea of Voldemort returning struck her with terror, she'd seen the looks in her parents' eyes when they talked about the 'old days', when they talked about how they had spent every waking moment fearing for the lives of all their loved ones.

Harry gave her an appraising look before speaking. "Yes and no." He idly spun his wand around his fingers and looked at her seriously "Last year? It was really just self-defence. I'm not going to go into the specifics, but I probably spent more time in the hospital wing last year than most do their entire time at Hogwarts." He paused, his eyes burning with anger and sorrow. "Now? Well, I still need to defend myself in Hogwarts, naturally," He smiled bitterly at her, "but if Voldemort comes back I need to be ready, the chances are that he'll want to take revenge on the kid who did him in at the age of one." He chuckled somewhat bitterly.

Ginny frowned by nodded at his words, she could certainly understand wanting to stave off Voldemort. She looked at him thoughtfully, "Couldn't you just, you know, flee?"

He tilted his head at her quizzically "You mean if Voldemort came back?" She nodded in response and he continued, "I could, I would, actually. I'm just not sure how much good it would do. I'm pretty sure if he really wanted to find me he could." He shook his head at the path the conversation was taking and quickly acted to bring it under control, "Anyway, that's something for the future, he might not even manage to come back at all after all." An evil smile appeared on Harry's face "Anyway, I think we should get back to your training."

Ginny nodded hesitantly, she didn't like the look on his face. "So, are we going back to shielding practice?" She couldn't keep a quaver out of her voice, attempting to block and dodge endless spells was a pretty harrowing ordeal.

Harry chuckled at her reaction. "Nah, I think you've had enough practice with that. Let us teach you..." He tilted his head in thought. "_Expulso_, the first spell I ever showed you in fact." He wandered over to her "It's a pretty powerful blasting curse, reacts differently to different materials, we'll go over that later. Anyway, the wand movements are like this…"

**-=S-S=-**

Morning rolled around and Harry woke Ginny earlier than usual, she replied with growls and unintelligible half-vocalised threats of bodily harm. He briefly chuckled but felt somewhat bad about the fact he was about to instantly shit all over her morning.

"Get up Ginny, we need to be ready to flee the Great Hall when the papers arrive remember?"

She groaned the discussions from yesterday suddenly rushing to the forefront of her mind. She forced her eyes open and began to ponder about how the day was going to play out. She found she wasn't really dreading the papers, most of her school mates had been acting like wankers since day one anyway.

She decided that her mother's reaction to her being sorted in Slytherin had so much more potential to hurt her. She prayed she would hold an open mind about things, but the simple fact of the matter was her mother was rather closed minded in regards to Slytherins, Ginny had many memories that reinforced the idea that her mother firmly believed that Slytherin was synonymous with Evil.

Shoving her bedding off herself and folding it into a neat pile she looked pleadingly at Harry "Can't we just stay here?" He raised an eyebrow at her and she pressed on, "Come on! It's Sunday, no one would mind!"

Harry simply chuckled, he'd felt the same many times last year, but had found it was better to let people get the name calling and pointing out of their systems on day one, allowing it to build up just resulted in longer to formulate more hurtful insults and more time to plan attacks.

"It's going to be fine Ginny, the article's not going to be just about you." He frowned slightly remembering the other issue, "If we get any howlers we can just cast Smothering Charms on them, Flitwick decided to teach me it last year when I started getting them daily." He grimaced slightly at the admission, but smirked slightly and continued "His ears are apparently pretty sensitive. The twins really appreciated learning it too."

She chuckled at that, she knew the twins had been subject to a number of howlers in their brief time at Hogwarts. She wondered if her mother even knew there were ways to counter a howler, she doubted it; she had seen her use them as a cure-all for any number of problems.

"I'm just… I'm not used to this stuff, you know?" Ginny admitted quietly. "I'm just uncomfortable thinking that everyone's going to be talking about me, about us."

Harry simply let out a brief snort at her words. "You think I'm used to the attention?" He looked over at her an amused expression on his face, "Do I look like Gilderoy bloody Lockhart?"

She smirked at this and leant over towards him squinting somewhat. "Oh my, you do! And you're already even more famous than he is! You should probably take up carrying around a quill for autographs too, maybe a stack of signed photos!" She paused leaning back, placing a finger against her lips as if thinking. "Yes, in fact it shouldn't be long before you get your own most charming smile award!"

Harry laughed cheerfully, glad that she was still capable of joking. "If I ever get to be as big of an arse as dear old Gilderoy, I give you permission to curse me."

"Of course," she grinned mischievously at him "though I don't really need your permission."

He grinned back "True, you are quite the handful." He slumped down in a seat opposite her makeshift sofa bed and gestured with a hand towards the bathroom. "Go get washed and dressed, we should be leaving soon."

Nodding she went to ready herself for what could be a very long day.

**-=S-S=-**

The Great Hall was completely empty when they arrived and Ginny was rather glad of Harry warning her to grab something to read while they waited, it would be quite a while before both breakfast and the post arrived.

As the hall filled up she noticed that several of the Slytherins were eying the two of them oddly, she brought this immediately to Harry's attention.

He gave the table a cursory scan and tutted in disgust "'The House of Cunning' indeed." He shook his head at the actions of his housemates. "Half of our housemates wouldn't know subtlety if it bit them in the arse."

Ginny let out a quiet giggle and continued looking around the hall, she caught eyes with the twins momentarily and gave them a brief wave before leaning over to ask harry a question. "Do the twins know about the article?"

He shook his head in response "I was told about it by Daphne Greengrass, I doubt she told anyone but me."

Ginny shot him an odd look recognising the name as a Slytherin girl in his year. "A Slytherin? I didn't think you got along with any of your year."

"Daphne's alright." He said shooting the mentioned girl a brief glance and finding her eyes upon him nodded just enough to acknowledge her, he supposed she was waiting for the fireworks. "She helped me a lot last year. She isn't really a _friend_ per se, it's more that she's an actual _Slytherin_ rather than the farces that most of the others are." He gestured in the direction of Malfoy idly.

Seeing that confusion evident on Ginny's face he elaborated "She helps me so that I owe her a favour." He stated bluntly "That or she just wanted to help the pathetic excuse for the Boy-Who-Lived that I was last year and doesn't want to tarnish her reputation of being callous." He paused, "I doubt that's it though."

Ginny shook her head at his words, frowning slightly and returned to the previous discussion, "So I get to witness my brothers' reactions to me being ousted as Harry Potter's evil whore, fantastic." she said dryly.

"'Harry Potter's Evil whore', eh? Sounds classy." Harry grinned at her and she rolled her eyes. "At least you already know how the twins are going to react."

She groaned at this and put her head in her hands, she had already had quite enough of their joking in the brief time they had escorted her. "This is going to be terrible isn't it?" He patted her on the head like one would a small child and she batted him off in annoyance, just in time for the food to appear on the plates before them.

They ate quickly, carrying out the barest of muted conversation. Ginny was curious about Harry's interactions with Daphne in the past, she was surprised that anyone within Slytherin was actually willing to risk the ire of most of their collective by helping him. Apparently Daphne had taken to warning him when an article was going out or when his housemates were planning something particularly vicious, he claimed he owed her a great deal already.

Ginny had to admit she was somewhat worried about what she would want when she eventually went to cash in a favour.

Roughly five minutes after they had finished eating the swarm of owls carrying the daily papers arrived, the last year had saw the subscription rates for the Daily Prophet soar, they had literally opened a 'Potter Post' service which only delivered papers when there was an article based around him. It was a shame that the articles were almost always negative; the service to existing would have been quite the honour otherwise.

Harry himself had naturally subscribed, it was always better to get the news from the paper directly rather than to hear the mocking second-hand recollections from classmates. He flipped open his own copy and frowned upon seeing the headline.

_**THE NEXT GENERATION OF DARKNESS**_

_Following last year's disturbing revelation of Harry Potter being a Slytherin with his hands in the Dark Arts by the Daily Prophet last year, Rita Skeeter, Special Corrspsondent is horrified to report that the Dark Boy is already dipping his fingers into the next generation of witches._

_This September one 'Virginia Weasley' was sorted into the noble house of Slytherin and the Daily Prophet regretfully reports has subsequently fallen given in to the temptations of Harry Potter, a known active practitioner of the Dark Arts and the only known living Parselmouth._

_Alarmingly enough Virginia comes from the Weasley family, previously known as being staunch supporters of Dumbledore, Muggle rights and all things light. It seems not even the purest of families is free from the touch of darkness lurking within Hogwarts' walls._

"_Harry Potter has attacked me several times, he often attacks using snakes and parseltongue with no provocation," says one Draco Malfoy, a second-year student. "He terrorises the entire school with these snakes and the teachers don't do anything, he even has his own chambers that only he can access by using parseltongue."_

_It should come as no surprise to past readers that the suspected heir of Slytherin has access to his own private chambers, but the more shocking revelation is that he has apparently taken Virginia Weasley girl as his live-in partner. "She can get into his chambers with her own personal password. She even sleeps in there with him." Says Pansy Parkinson another second-year. "There are rumours that the Weasleys may have sold her to Potter."_

_The Weasley family are known for their pureblood heritage and it is entirely within the realm of possibility they have decided to embrace the older customs many pureblood families do by arranging a traditional betrothal agreement. We at the Daily Prophet find ourselves concerned for the future of Virginia Weasley and wish her the best of luck in her future endeavours._

Harry was pleasantly surprised upon finishing the article. "It's not that bad," he handed the paper over to Ginny and she immediately started skimming the article on them. "You're painted as an innocent little girl that I've either tempted into following my evil ways or one that I've outright purchased."

He chuckled to himself. "Your mother is probably going to be receiving some howlers. The public aren't going to like you being sold off to Harry Potter."

Ginny looked at him looking quite horrified at her mother receiving howlers on her behalf. "This isn't going to end well." Her face then twisted into a scowl, "'Virginia'? They didn't even get my name right!"

Harry simply grinned at her for a moment before asking "Are we going to wait here for the post or go somewhere it will be easier to handle?"

Ginny looked around the hall and saw that numerous people were pointing or staring at her or Harry all while whispering to their neighbours and others at their tables. "Let's go somewhere else, I don't want everyone to be watching if I get attacked by howlers." She paused and added, "Even if you can get rid of them."

Harry nodded completely understanding and led her towards an empty section of the dungeons. It was a simple stone room that looked as if it had once been a class room, it was completely devoid of furniture and had but a single entrance.

"Welcome to my mail room." Said harry with an extravagant bow. "This is where I came last year whenever I heard an article was being published, at least whenever I could. The room's owl accessible, but they all have to fly through the same door we used to get in here." He gestured with a brief nod "It makes it pretty easy to pick off the Howlers. I generally just burn all the other letters, I've had a few that were cursed and I just don't bother trying to read them anymore. Sadly we can only use this on weekends, during the week we'll just have to cut losses as best we can." He paused before adding "I'll teach you the Smothering Charm tonight." as an afterthought.

It didn't take long for a horde of owls to descend into the dungeons, Harry expertly picked off any and all Howlers that headed for them and she heard muted cries of 'chauvinist' and 'fiend' as the howlers died mid-flight. Ginny was surprised when instead of the howler she expected she got a normal looking letter from her father.

_Dear Ginny,_

_We're very glad to hear from you, your mother was somewhat distressed at hearing what house you had been sorted into but I have managed to calm her down. Thank you for the warning of the article, we shall be sure to take everything within with a grain of salt. _

_Your mother insists I remind you to still be careful around Harry Potter. I will try and personally ensure she doesn't send the poor lad any howlers, the twins spoke highly of the boy over the summer so I can't see him being all that bad._

_It does not matter what your house is, you're a Weasley and our daughter. It doesn't matter what house that silly old hat put you in, nothing will change what you are. Always remember that we will love you no matter what._

_Love Dad_

Ginny felt herself sag with relief against the wall she had chosen to lean against, her father at least didn't care that she was a Slytherin. The fact that he had had to take over from her Mother spoke volumes of her real reaction however, she suddenly found herself thinking that staying at Hogwarts over Christmas would be a good idea. She found herself simply feeling immensely glad that she hadn't been disowned because of the paper.

She looked around and noticed that Harry had had finished dealing with the swarms of letters for him and that there was now a small pile of charred paper in the middle of the room. He headed over to her and attempted to read her letter over her shoulder and received a slap for his efforts.

"Ow!" He grumbled, rubbing his face. "Bit excessive there, Gin"

She growled at him and handed him the letter, "Ask next time you git; it could have been private!"

He chuckled and began reading, a serious expression overtaking him. "Your dad seems nice," he hesitated momentarily as if unsure to voice his thoughts "It sounds as if your Mother didn't take it quite as well as hoped."

Ginny grimaced and nodded in acknowledgement. "Yea, Dad only takes over if she's going off on one inappropriately." She sighed "I'm probably lucky I didn't get disowned."

Harry placed his hand on her shoulder and gave it a brief squeeze, "So, what do you want to do today?"

Ginny smiled, glad of him steering the conversation away from her family, "Well first off I'd like to learn the Smothering Charm," she flashed him a brief grin "It looked like good target practice."

He chuckled in response, "That it is, the owls attack pretty sharpish if you miss." He rubbed the back of his head slightly. "Being attacked by a swarm of owls isn't something you soon forget."

Ginny laughed at the mental image of Harry being swarmed by owls and smirked at him "Is that how you're so accurate?"

He grinned at her "It certainly helped." He sobered slightly but still smiled at her "Anyway, do you want to start right away?"

Ginny smiled brightly at him. "Of course!" Smiling Harry led her back to their training room.

It was not until they went to retire for the night that Harry suddenly realised he hadn't delivered the Diary to Snape that day, shrugging mentally he promised himself that he would deliver it during potions the next day.

**-=S-S=-**

The morning passed without much of an incident, apparently the article hadn't generated as much of a buzz as the previous ones had – presumably due to it being mostly recycled information – and they managed to get by with only a single howler trying to scream at Harry, he had given Ginny the honours of dispatching it and was only mildly disappointed when she hadn't missed and hit the owl or another student.

They separated after breakfast and Harry immediately set out to DADA, he was not looking forward to his first session with Lockhart but contented himself with the fact that he would be disposing of the diary in potions immediately following it.

He arrived in his lesson to find that most of the Slytherins had extremely sullen looks on their faces, he could but imagine that their first session with Lockhart had been as bad as Ginny's if their attitudes were anything to go by. Lockhart arrived promptly at the start of the lesson, sweeping in with a grin on his face and one of his books under his arms.

"Hello class!" His grin didn't falter at the fact every student present completely ignored him "Today we're going to be continuing from where we left off last week! I believe we were on page 142 of _'Magical Me'_ he stood and started pacing the room expectantly as the students flipped open the book to the right page in the book and readied their quills. "Ah yes! This chapter covers how I prepared to see out the Wagga Wagga Werewolf! Dreadfully important preparation, imagine if I had forgotten to take any silver with me!" He smiled around the room, expertly ignoring the lack of laughter. "Anyway, I want you to make a list of everything I took with me and note down why it was genius of me to take those specific items!" He looked around the room briefly, grin firmly in place before clapping once with a proclamation of "Off you go then!"

Harry groaned at the work, finding himself incredibly depressed that Ginny hadn't been exaggerating about the contents of her lesson. He was onto the third item on the list, a 'magical tent' when Lockhart walked by him and was tripped by another student, sending him crashing into Harry's belongings and sending them scattering across the floor.

Lockhart quickly righted himself, using harry to support his weight "Oh my, how clumsy of me! Sorry about that Mr Potter!" Harry simply sighed and made to stand and grab his belongings when Lockhart rather forcefully pushed him back into his seat with his infuriating smile firmly fixed in place "Now, now, Harry! We wouldn't want you to get behind everyone else! Allow me to pick these things up!"

Harry found it bizarre that the man would lower himself to collecting his belongings for him but shrugged and muttered out a "Go right ahead." before returning to the ridiculous task the man had assigned the class.

Lockhart had returned most of his belongings before Harry heard a voice dripping with forced disappointment call out "Tut, tut, Mr Potter! Stealing a diary? Have you no shame?" Harry looked at the man's hand and was horrified to find that Tom Riddle's diary was firmly grasped in his hand.

"Sir that's -" He was instantly cut off by the man slamming his hand onto his desk with a loud bang.

"Mr Potter, if there's one thing I cannot abide it is a thief! I will return this diary to the rightful owner! And you, you shall serve detention with me this Wednesday evening!" His tone was firm and Harry found himself simultaneous furious at the fact the man must have been flicking through the Diary to discover it did not belong to Harry and genuinely surprised that he could pull off the disciplinarian act at all.

"Of course, Professor." He growled out. The man had complicated his plans for the diary quite a bit, he would have to try and get the Diary back at the end of the session or convince Snape to retrieve it himself to investigate it.

Lockhart glanced around the room, and upon noticing all eyes on him he instantly fixed his smile in place and cheerfully shouted out. "Back to work class!"

Harry sighed watching Lockhart head to his desk, diary in hand, and decided to wait out the session to see what he could do.

**-=S-S=-**

Lockhart smiled brightly at Harry as he approached the desk at the end of the session, Harry could see the diary placed amongst the numerous books and signed memorabilia the man seemed to keep on his desk. His nose turned up in mild disgust at the man's vanity, he really was amazingly full of himself for having displayed such little practical ability whilst teaching.

"Professor?" He put on his most charming tone, hoping to get the Diary back with the least amount of fuss in order to get it to Snape as soon as possible.

"Hello Mr Potter, what is it you want?" He said with his trademark smile plastered firmly in place.

Harry resisted the urge to hex the man for being insufferable and pressed on. "The Diary you took, it wasn't stolen. It was a gift off a friend, a muggle I knew before Hogwarts, sir." He shot the man his most charming smile, praying it would be enough. "It's the only thing I have off him and I'd really like it back. Would that be alright, sir?"

Lockhart smiled brightly at Harry and stood up to slap his hands on the boy's shoulders. "Harry, Harry, Harry." He paused dramatically, smile widening "Of course you can have it back! I wouldn't dare keep you from the mementos of a friend!" He took a step around Harry seemingly headed for the exit and called out "Just grab it off my desk Harry, no harm done!"

Sighing with relief Harry headed around the desk and started searching through the books on the man's desk, slightly annoyed that it didn't seem to be where he thought he had saw it. Knocking a stack of signed photographs he groaned and while leaning to pick them up didn't even hear the whisper of "_Obliviate_" from behind him.

Lockhart gently maneuvered him towards the exit, before pushing him through the door and clicking his fingers in front of him until he came to. "Harry, Harry my boy!" Harry's gradually focused and he looked at the man in front of him confused. "Professor, what was I doing?"

Lockhart gently patted him on the shoulders "You were just leaving, Harry! You spaced out for a second, off you go!"

Harry blinked, feeling as if he was forgetting something but finding he had no clue what, he simply nodded at the man and headed for his next class. Lockhart watched him go, idly humming to himself before returning to his desk. Reaching it he sat down, grabbed a quill and flipped open the diary, beginning to write.

**-=S-S=-**

**Author's Notes:  
**

Well the chances of me finishing this are frankly so slim it's barely worth hoping for. The story itself was not really considered carefully enough while I was initially writing it and as such is rather far from the tone I actually desired. So, I figured I'd do a brief compilation of the ideas and plot lines I wished to explore within Serpentine Serenade rather than simply leave an unfinished story to rot like so many others.

**_Basic ideas I was going to explore:_**

**The Diary –** The diary was intended to be Tom's only Horcrux in this universe with significantly more power over a victim. It was intended to be more of a body snatcher in execution than the Diary in the actual novels. Possessing Lockhart rather than stealing his soul to recompose his teenage body. The main plot point would have been in it becoming obvious that the diary itself had ½ of Tom's soul with the shade of Voldemort being a fragmented shade of his past self after triggering the protections laid by Harry's mother.

Naturally this would also have scrapped the Harry as a Horcrux and the whole willing sacrifice shtick from the Deathly Hallows with the fragment having been dominated by Harry in his youth. This would have caused nothing but a slightly higher inclination towards Slytherin than canon Harry and much more affinity towards the mental arts due to the lack of a mental link to Voldemort.

**Lockhart –** Lockhart took the diary purely because of his ego, the negative press around Harry making him wearing of any attempts to shape him as he felt was his duty in the canon version of events. He interacted with the Diary simply by signing it in his usual flamboyant manner and finding himself immediately enthralled. Even with some impressive mental defences he would falter against an all-out attack from a Tom Riddle who's far more interested in claiming a body to manipulate than keeping his mental faculties functioning (As a fraud who specialises in mind manipulation to keep the fact he is one a secret, I simply did not want him to be the moronic character he was in the original books).

Of course the only reason the Diary would have the power to launch this attack would stem from Ginny's previous interactions giving it the strength required to pierce Lockhart's defences.

Lockhart's apparent charisma and desire for fame would affect Tom due to the more symbiotic relationship to the Diary they would have, resulting in a Voldemort grounded in reality and more disposed to political actions than outright violence and domination.

**Harry –** Harry was honestly meant to end up as a mash mash up of canon Harry, Snape and Lupin, reluctant to connect to others but knowledgeable and willing to protect those he had come to care for regardless of personal cost or the cost enforced on others. A darker but not dark take on the character who would eventually overcome Voldemort through strength stolen and gained over the years. Would have ended up shipped with either Daphne or Ginny, likely the latter due the very nature of the Ginny becoming a Slytherin set up.

**Ginny –** Ginny was to be shaped into a suitably powerful companion to Harry, somewhat similar to Unspeakable Things by one Darth Marrs. Her family would have acted as an easy source of drama and representation of various stances upon Harry early on. I was pretty much winging it on how she was going to turn out in the end.

**Daphne –** Daphne was around as a way of providing information to Harry that it was unreasonable for him to know himself. All of the information would come at a price likely reaching a crescendo post victory with the Greengrass family finding themselves in a rather Malfoy-esque position in regards to the magical power structure.

**Overlying plot –** Lockhart would shape up to be a better teacher with the influence of Voldemort eventually shaping up to actually be decent enough at it to get everyone passing grades without much problem. Harry would naturally have no recall of the Diary which would incite an investigation that Voldehart would simply defuse with more mental manipulation.

Voldehart would take an interest in Harry and Ginny, intrigued that both had ended up in Slytherin after their family ties and Harry's own apparent defeat of himself as a child. Most of the year would be normal with Dobby turning up at Christmas to confront Harry and finding himself simply ejected by the various defences that the Slytherin Dungeons have. Voldehart would take to the world seeking various sources of powers while ironically acting as a defusal mechanism for both the Weasley family's negativity and the press in general with public approval bursts as he would stay in contact with both Harry and Ginny.

Third year onwards was nothing but a cluster of ideas even while the story was my active focus. The Lockhart / Voldemort would end up as the true victor, becoming somewhat of a benevolent dictator who would lift the magical UK out of the hole they'd fallen into. Harry would naturally deal the coup de grace to Voldemort while sinking into the background as an unspeakable, along with whichever lady I ended up having him tied to.

**-=S-S=-**

I may one day get around to finishing this, but I'd much rather pursue other things for now. Feel free to use these ideas wherever you wish. Anyone who feels up to it can continue the base story I have established should they desire to, I simply ask you drop me a line to ask for my blessing to do so.


End file.
